


The Right Thing

by star_ship



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 69 (Sex Position), Alternate Canon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anal, Anal Fingering, Angel Sam Winchester, Angst, Biting, Blood and Torture, Bromance, Castiel Angst, Crying Dean, Cured Crowley, Drama, Fallen Castiel, First Kiss, First Time, Friendship, Frottage, Guns, Hand Jobs, Human Castiel, Hunter Castiel, Hurt Sam Winchester, Kissing, Love Confessions, M/M, Male Slash, Minor Character Death, Mutual Masturbation, Porn Watching, Protective Castiel, Rape/Non-con References, Shower Sex, Submissive/Bottom Dean, Supernatural Season 08, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-12
Updated: 2013-08-05
Packaged: 2017-12-11 17:06:38
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 43,276
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/801078
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/star_ship/pseuds/star_ship
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Parallel/alternate ending to Season 8: Castiel knew he was risking his fall when he took the tablet. He's defied Heaven before, but there are only so many chances one man gets. And that's all he is now, a man, back on the Winchesters' doorstep and into the line of fire. All he ever tries to do is the right thing, and it seems like the right thing is never what it seems. At least Dean knows his heart is in the right place, but that doesn't make them any less screwed six ways from Sunday. Abaddon has the Angel Tablet, Metatron has used him to evacuate Heaven, and Hell might be closed, but at a strange price for Sam. There were no truer words than that old saying: The road to Hell is paved with good intentions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Every Time a Bell Rings

**Author's Note:**

> This is a parallel story arc most immediately following Goodbye, Stranger and including some canon plot elements up to The Great Escapist. It will/should continue on as an alternate ending to Season 08. Feel free to yell at me if I seem to have put it on the back burner. Any and all feedback is encouraged and appreciated!

He was starting to smell. This was new. Two and a half days in the same seat with the bag cradled in his lap, the tablet making his left leg go numb, and he was starting to take on a soured odor. He knew what that meant, but he pretended he didn’t, that it wasn’t real. Dean’s blood was still on his knuckles and he pretended otherwise with that, too.

He’d healed him. He couldn’t heal the metamorphosis of the trial in Sam and he couldn’t fix the aching, terminal void inside himself, but he remembered that much, that Dean had been free of a scratch before he’d fled. His faith was at least that strong.

The Winchesters, their weakness was each other, but Castiel hoped he had a weakness more profound than two human brothers in one stuck time, vessels of his own lost brothers or not. He thought so, at least, he believed as much, and that counted for truth most of the time. That was what they called faith.

Some things still stuck, and he wondered if that was Jimmy, if the devout man his vessel has once been had always heard the lilting high song of angel voices, but the ears he heard them with now translated no words, only the keening sounds, lost now and again in the grinding of wheels and engine. He’d started his journey on his last angel-mojo zap to Portland, Maine, and he had stayed on as long as the driver had let him. He’d thought far enough ahead to be abundant with cash. As long as that was true, the driver would let him. He didn’t feel good about where the money had come from, but what mattered was keeping the tablet safe, keeping his head low.

That’s why he was on this bus.

No other reason.

Not because he’d loved man too much, like his Father had asked.

Not because he’d loved one single man too much.

Not because he had betrayed Heaven, and Heaven had payed the favor back.

But he was starting to smell, and he knew better.

A day more, maybe he’d admit it, take a homeless bath in the sink of the next station and start to think about what the need of that bath meant, but not yet. Not now. His faith still weighted him like the tablet in the bag in his lap and the heavy stone in his heart that was Dean’s eyes begging for some piece of him that hadn’t drawn a full breath in over a year, and until that changed, he wouldn’t admit what had become of him. He didn’t know what would become of him if he did.

“We’re family. We need you. I need you.”

He didn’t know he was saying it outloud until the woman in front of him turned around, made uncomfortable. He was a mess. That overcoat, it made people uncomfortable, made them think he had something that went BANG under it, and he knew that without the little things left inside Jimmy to tell him so. For the first time since the light first touched the earth, Castiel pressed his brow to the window and closed his eyes, and he slept.

The bus stopped short in Portland, Oregon and Castiel’s head slipped forward onto the seat in front of him, jarring him awake. He had existed as rivers and winds and storms and the crackling electricity of lovers, the most vibrant, harrowing passages of great speeches, the rippling clouds of sunset, he had watched the bated sleep breath of both Winchesters and a hundred other impossible mortal men like them, had glistened against the atmosphere in the photons of starlight, and jarring awake, sour-mouthed and needing to piss somewhere in Oregon, Castiel realized, really knew, admitted for the first time, that all that, all those things he had been, all his Grace, was gone, and that for the first time since the light had touched the earth, he was human.

He got off the bus.

The bag felt heavy and his arms felt weak, all over, he felt weak, and God, but he’d never felt so weak before, not even then, not even with Dean bloody and swollen from his own hands and begging for mercy in words of such compassion, now he felt even weaker. He stumbled into the bathroom and had to think very hard how to pull himself out and urinate without making a royal mess. When that was done, he dragged himself back out into the blasting A/C of the lobby and then into the cooly still, stale air of night. The dark was dark. His Grace had shined a light into every corner of the world, and now shadows cloaked each corner, a muddled grey blanket with flashing lights here and there off in the distance.

At the corner, there was a pay phone, and he thanked God, because fuck Naomi, he still believed, he still had faith, he would always have that, he still remembered Dean’s phone number, and he walked into the booth.

There was always one dollar and seven cents in Jimmy’s pocket. Even after the Leviathan had shattered him apart and Dean had kept that smelly old coat in the trunk of the Impala, there had always been just that much.

He shoved some change clumsily into the slot and dialed the number.

/Leave your name, number, and nightmare. I’ll get back to ya./

The words crowded at the base of his throat. He gripped the receiver tighter. “Dean…” He hoped that the message would not be deleted outright in that half second, in that one syllable. “I’m sorry. Please understand. I’ll do my best to keep in touch.”

He hung up the phone and it spit a nickle back out at him. He fished it from the slot and dropped it into his pocket of the coat that stank because he was stinking, shoved the bag into the large inner pocket, and started to walk.

It would be a long night. Dean’s blood was still on his hands. He kept walking.

\---

Weeks went by slow and hard. His faith as thin as it was, he still prayed to God and thanked him every night for leaving him with Jimmy's gift. He didn't know if his Grace had enhanced it, honed it into the shining eye nestled in Jimmy's heart--it wasn't Jimmy's heart anymore, he had to remind himself, it was his now--that he was able to turn to the open road and make it back to Kansas. He'd known early on that running had been a mistake. He'd panicked. Maybe some of what Naomi had wedged inside his psyche had stuck. He couldn't clearly explain now the reasoning that had inhabited him when he had run away from Dean. Dean, of all people, he had run from him, and for once it wasn't to protect his charge, he knew that much. It had been to protect, not even the tablet, but himself.

It didn't matter now. Somewhere in a cheap motel--he wasn't about to think about how he'd gotten the money, he wasn't proud of it but it had been necessary--he had turned himself around and thought of Dean's eyes begging him to come back, for the glimmering part of his Grace that was Cas as they knew him, Cas, not Castiel, not a soldier, but the soul who had become a friend and a brother to him. In that moment, a human ache in his stomach that had made his eyes sting, he knew he had to go back.

The farther back east he wandered, hitching rides and walking and stowing away on a train car for a good long stretch, the more delerious he became, no money to eat much more than a cheeseburger here and there or palm an apple from a fruit stand. He felt guilty stealing, but it only piled onto an already monolithic heap of guilt.

The delerium at least polished the lens on the shining eye and when he spotted the back end of the Impala around the bend as he trudged heavy-legged down the dirt road, he let out a sob and thanked God again, from an aching place in his heart that still truly believed, truly loved, an atrophied part, ill-used. He missed that part.

Minutes passed between his banging on the heavy door and he thought maybe this was the wrong place. Maybe they were dead and the Impala had been left to rust out on this back road, maybe they were gone or asleep or knew it was him and weren't opening up. The stinging in his eyes had started up again when the door yanked open and he was staring into the barrel of Sam's pistol. He didn't flinch. Sam's wrist quaked for a moment and Castiel watched the pad of his finger compress against the trigger for a split second before he let up and lowered the gun. Cas' focus shifted from the now absent barrel to Sam's face. There was an immediate, wordless recognition between them of exhaustion, a sympathy of being worn down to the bone. Sam's big hands grabbed at Cas' shoulders, the gun shoved down the back of his jeans, and pulled him into a warm hug.

Cas pressed himself against Sam's chest and looped his arms around his waist, not missing how skinny he felt under his shirt, how bony the shoulder was under his cheek, but it felt good to be touched. His skin had been hungry, a human hunger, he guessed, things he still had to get used to, had to recognize and feed. So much work, being alive with a clock to punch. Sam was burning up and he could smell a stale sweat on him, but it still felt good and they hugged each other for a long moment before Sam lifted his chin off of Cas's head and pulled away. "Where have you been, man?" The first syllable sounded angry and accusatory, but it died quickly into softened concern. Castiel was struck with the vivid impression that Sam was too tired to be angry.

He sighed and spread his hands uselessly in front of him. "A lot of places. I... I suppose you could say I had a break down. I'm sorry if I concerned you."

Sam pursed his lips, his brow furrowing down over his dark-ringed eyes, hollowed out and blood shot. "Dean tried to tell me what happened, but I don't think I got the full story. Get in here, come sit down, I want to hear what in the hell's going on straight from the source."

He stepped back and into the doorway, taking his pistol out of the back of his pants and setting it down on a shelf just beside the row of locks. Cas followed him in, blinking to adjust to the darkness of the antechamber, following Sam into the compound once the door was closed and heavily locked. "Where is Dean?" he asked with labored attempts not to sound desperate of the answer.

"He's, ah, he's out. Taking a walk. He's been doing that a lot lately, needing to clear his head, keep it on straight. I'd guess he's been doing a lot of praying, too." He led Cas into a large kitchen, built barracks style, grabbing down two glasses and filling them with tap water, handing one to Cas. He was giving the other a pointed look, but Castiel did not pursue it. If Dean was praying to him, his words were falling onto deaf ears. His chest panged tightly and he tried to keep the sensation from showing on his face. He thought briefly what if Naomi was holding onto his Grace, trapped like a lightning bug in a jar, if Dean's prayers were playing from it like a radio, if she was hearing the words Dean meant only for him, and the pang turned into a rapid boil, but Sam's hand on his shoulder broke him out of it. "Dude, you look really rough." He guided Cas to the small table he and Dean had dragged into the kitchen to eat at, pushing him down into a chair. "Tell me everything. I mean everything, all right?"

Cas frowned, looking down at the glass of water in his hand and taking a tentative sip. 'Everything' was a very complicated affair. He quickly worked out which bits were nonessential for Sam's understanding of what had transpired and dove into a militaristic debriefing of the events. Sam's expression swam deeper and deeper into hurt and confusion the more Castiel spoke, but he didn't interrupt, staying slumped in his chair opposite the other and listening to the run down, gripping his own knee tightly when Cas stared off at a corner of the kitchen and described beating Dean within an inch of his life. When Cas got to the part Sam knew about, his connection to Naomi's puppet strings severing and then leaving with the tablet, he paused for a long moment, drinking his glass of water and trying to mock up the words to describe what had happened next.

"I... zapped, to a place in Portland, Maine. I took a bus. I thought, if I had my... angel radio, turned off, and took human transport, I would stay off Heaven's radar. I rode aimlessly for several days, I was... confused, and lost. I--" He stopped, wondering if he could say these words, if Sam would hate him for them. "I had Dean's blood on my hands, still. I was shaken and lost, Sam. I didn't know what to do, and finally I realized I'd made a mistake and started coming back to you. I made my choice when the connection broke. I didn't kill Dean because I chose to defy Heaven's orders. I didn't kill Dean because Dean has been my charge for..." He pursed his lips and looked down at the floor, at Sam's bare toes and remembered for a tiny second singing softly to him as a child. Children could hear his voice, he could sing for him without harm. He had decided a long time ago neither of them would ever know that he had always been their guardian. He'd done such a horrible job, he couldn't let them understand just how completely he had failed them. That night, a few months after the fire, he had felt in such a state of loss--he should have stopped Azazel, even though he knew what had happened was fate, that his Winchesters were meant for this all along, he had wept to see them now on the path he had hoped would not ever present itself to them. Sam had cried all night and John was on a hunt. Dean was crying, too. All he wanted was to sleep. He missed his mother. 'Sammy', he'd sobbed, 'Sammy please stop crying, it's OK'. And Dean had wept and Castiel had sung to Sam until he quieted and fell asleep. Castiel would never tell them that, never could, but seeing Sam's bare toes made him think of his chubby infant feet and he remembered the song he'd sang to him, and the stinging in his eyes began once more to think that he would never sing that song again.

"I..." Fat, hot tears soaked his lashes and spilled down his cheeks. Sam looked panicked. "I fell." His breath caught in his throat and he made the glass to the table before it dropped out of his hands, spilling the last few swallows out onto the wooden top. Sam righted the glass quickly and looked on, terrified, as Cas crumpled over, burying his face in his arms, sobbing openly. He felt broad hands on his back, smoothing across his shoulders to comfort him, but his heart ached and he couldn't breathe well beyond the convulsions of moans and gasps for air. He had not said it yet, had not admitted it so outright. To have said it felt as if it had finished the process fully, that now without doubt, he was just a baby in a trench coat, a very old, very sad man that had just clocked in on a hard, long shift.

Sam got up after a while and brought back a tea towel, sopping up the spill and patting Cas' back again. He was beginning to calm down, crying himself out, his crumbled world turning on. When he finally sat up again, Sam's tired face lit up in warm sympathy as he offered him the tea towel and Cas took it, dabbing at his face, snorting and catching his breath. "I'm sorry." He could see it in Sam's eyes that he meant it. He couldn't put into words that look, how much he wished Castiel had not lost his Grace, had not felt the pain that had doubled him over just now. Cas smiled sadly. Sam had always been so good, his heart pure despite his mistakes, despite his demonic corruption. Tentatively, Cas leaned forward and put his arms out. He was glad when Sam met him halfway in another hug. When he pulled away, Castiel felt a little lighter, a little less burdened. He watched Sam quickly put together a few things from the new information and the other stood up, gesturing towards the atrium of the compound. "You can go wash up if you want, you, uh... you kind of stink, Cas." He gave a crooked grin and Cas returned it, nodding and standing up on shaky legs, following Sam through the large central room to the barracks hall. He could smell Dean's... everything as they progressed down the corridor. A wild bird rattled inside the cage of his heart, memories and feelings and emotions stacked disheveled together awakening at the familiar scents. Sam stopped at the door at the end of the hall, a large bathroom like a dorm locker, flicking on the lights. "Use whatever you need, we don't mind. Clean towels are under the sink. Dean's room is that one on the right, his stuff will probably fit you better than mine will. I'll make us something to eat."

Cas stepped into the bathroom and shed off his trench coat, dirty and wreaking. "Thank you, Sam."

Sam pointed towards a laundry basket in the corner, smiling, a golden glimmer in his weary face. "Of course. This is what family does."

Cas' eyes welled up with tears again and Sam closed the door.

It felt good to be clean. He took his time, enjoying the simple tasks that would become common place for him now, scrubbing himself clean, washing the dirt and grease out of his hair, standing under the water turned as hot as he could stand it until he was pink all over and the steam had made it hard to breathe. Stepping out of the shower rushed him with cold and he quickly wrapped himself in a clean white towel, wiping the mirror clear and staring at himself, bearded and weathered and unhaloed. His wings weighted his back in phantom cruelty, but he did not see them, either, as he usually would in a mirror. This was it. He had to accept that. This human form that had once been only his vessel, had been another man entire, it was him now. God help him...

He opened Sam's medicine cabinet and got to work trimming his beard down, shaving his face clean. It wasn't hard, he had steady hands and had watched Dean do it enough times. Digging around in a drawer, he found a tooth brush still in a package and that proved a little more difficult than it looked. He stabbed himself in the cheek a few times and his gums bled. He choked when he tried to brush his tongue and the tooth paste felt terrible going down when he swallowed a frothy glob of it. A baby in a trench coat... a useless, unknowing infant.

Clean and dry, he found Dean's room easily, closing himself in and standing naked in the middle of it. He had to look around first. This man... a smile had pulled itself onto his mouth, but his heart was still aching. As a teenager, Dean had dreamed of having a room like this. Records, turn table, weapons, a desk, books, a bed all to himself (he and Sam had been relegated to the same bed or rock-paper-scissors fights for the floor until Dean was fifteen) and here it finally was, his old dream. A space all his own that wasn't on four wheels. At the desk was a type writer with a date at the top of the page in the ream. Castiel read the first few words before stopping. These were thoughts more private to Dean than even his prayers. He would respect them enough to let them remain unread.

He hadn't realized how similar he and Dean's bodies were. Perhaps because before, his vessel had been only that. He hadn't paid attention to it. The legs of the jeans were a little long, gathering around his ankles, but they fit. The t-shirt was soft and smelled like Dean even clean and Cas rubbed his hand over the screen printed front, seeing the same album cover on the shelf by the record player, Led Zeppelin, a hermit carrying a lamp. There was a full length mirror on the back of the door and Castiel regarded himself in it unfamiliarly, studying the person reflected, wearing Dean's clothes, no ghost of his old true form glowing around the human vessel. He knew it would take a very long time to get used to.

Sam had made soup and sandwiches and poured glasses of iced tea (he didn't say, but Cas knew Dean had made it) and they sat together at the table eating, Sam's turn to talk, giving Cas the run down on the second trial. He was stunned to hear about Naomi's interference. It meant she did not know he had fallen. He filed the fact away to use later if necessary and let Sam continue. A laugh caught him off guard when Sam retold that Charlie had called him dreamy to Dean. He had not missed the descriptions in Chuck's book and had always cast it off as artistic license. The notion left his mind quickly when Sam began telling him about Kevin being dead--he had to be soothed quickly that they only thought Kevin was dead--and that they had found Metatron. 

"So anyway, that's where we sit. Trying to figure out what in the hell curing a demon means. I'm beat and every five minutes I have a moment where I want to break down and give up, but I don't, and Dean doesn't either, so I guess we're all good. We haven't got even the start of a clue how to tackle this third trial, or where to look, or anything, but... we wont give up. Not yet, not today, at least, and that's something for us anymore. It's been getting pretty rough." He sighed and looked Cas over. "I guess it's been pretty rough for you, too."

Cas could only nod, sitting with Sam in silence, mopping up the last of the soup with a piece of bread. He helped Sam carry the dishes to the sink and was about to offer to wash them when a voice he knew better than any other boomed through the other room into the kitchen, "Dude, I saw a squirrel the size of a freakin' toddler out there! Where's dad's old rifle, I'm gonna try and--"

Cas was frozen in his spot, feet cemented to the floor. Sam thought quickly and scurried back to the table to put some distance between himself and the potential impending atomic implosion. Dean turned the corner into the kitchen and stopped cold, stopped breathing, stopped talking, his heart for a moment stopped beating, his eyes locking onto Cas, Cas clean but tired and worn, Cas in his favorite t-shirt and his old blue jeans, Cas here right now in their bat cave, and in those blue eyes, he knew it was really /Cas/.

Castiel wet his lips and stammered a bit before getting out, "Hello, Dean."

There was another breath of staring, of locked in one another like they'd found themselves time and again over the last few years, exchanging so much in a glance that could not be expressed in any other way. When Dean finally moved, charging at him, Cas' hand's came up to defend himself, afraid of being hit, but Dean's arms locked around him and his face pressed against his throat and a warm melting sense of relief poured through his whole body as he hugged Dean back, dropping his head down and resting his cheek against Dean's shoulder. "Where in the hell have you been?" Dean growled, his breath and lips hot against Castiel's skin, his stubble scraping Castiel's neck. Cas shook his head, squeezing Dean harder, feeling a strong hand thread up into his hair. "I thought you were dead, or AWOL for good. Where the fuck did you go?"

"Dean, I'm so sorry. For everything. I panicked, the tablet, it's set to a distress signal when first opened, before a prophet touches it, I... I'm sorry, please understand. I was afraid to stay after what I'd done to you and I didn't understand what had broken the link. I had to leave." Dean pulled away but stayed close, in Cas' personal space. Cas' hands slid from around Dean's back and rest on his shoulders. "I can't justify leaving like that, but I'm back now. I have the tablet. I want to help you close Hell."

"There's something different in you." It was like Dean had been hearing Castiel through a sieve, storing the words for later, but his eyes were searching the angel's face, noting the subtle differentness of it. His angel was his angel again, but...

"He fell." Castiel gave Sam a look of heaping gratitude, not wanting to be the one to say it again in a single day.

Dean's eyes flashed and his seized Cas' face, studying him like the change would be visible to him. Cas knew, because it broke his heart, that Dean could not see his halo, or his wings, or hear his true voice, not since he had been a child. He would not recognize their absence. "You what? How? Why?"

Cas shook his head, realizing how close he and Dean still were. "I don't know. It wasn't exactly conscious. I knew the risk I was taking, but... I've defied Heaven before and kept my Grace. I suppose I'd run out of chances." That wasn't the whole truth... Naomi had told him 'you have to choose, us or them' and he'd known what that meant. Of course, it didn't explain why she didn't seem to know he had fallen. He'd deal with that later.

"So you're... human?" Dean's hands had gone down to Cas' shoulders and Cas' own hands were on Dean's biceps.

"Yes. It's my soul, it's still me, but... Jimmy's body is mine, now. I'm locked in it. I have none of my Grace left." He thought he might cry again and tried to smile instead, attempting to find a bright side. "I do retain some minor psychic abilities Jimmy had."

Dean huffed a laugh and hugged him again, running his fingers through Castiel's hair. Cas looped his arms tight around Dean's neck and squeezed his eyes shut against a veil of tears. A cry baby in a trench coat... not even the trench coat anymore. In a worn vintage tee that smelled like the man embracing him. Sam shuffled his feet and coughed into his hand awkwardly. "I'm just gonna, um, go back to that research, then."

Dean pulled away from Cas again, breaking contact completely, shaken out of it by his brother's voice. "Yeah, OK, don't wear yourself out, Sammy, y'hear me?"

He watched Sam go off towards the main library, glad to see him walking less like a newborn fawn, turning back to Cas and sidestepping him to the fridge, pulling out two beers and opening them, handing one to Cas, who took it and leaned back against the counter, Dean leaning against the opposite counter facing him. "I've had nightmares, you know, about you beating me. I keep seeing your face over and over again, that dead look in your eyes when you broke my wrist. It terrified me. You were gone, and this shape that looked like you was going to kill me."

"Dean, please, I'm so sorry--"

"No. Let me finish. That's haunted me, Cas. I might have been healed, but it still left a scar. The same thing happened with Sam when he let Lucifer wear him to the prom, and then, yeah, it hurt, but not like it did with you. Fuck that bitch for choosing you to try and kill me. Fuck her, she could have come down and ganked me herself, but she had to use you instead, had to make sure it got into my head. I don't blame you, Cas. I wanted to and I was mad as hell and cursin' your name, but I don't blame you, because I know better, and I know that wasn't you. You've fucked up a lot, but part of me, maybe against my better judgement, probably that much, is always gonna trust you. You get me?"

Cas drained half the beer listening, nodding at the question. "Yes. I get you, Dean. I hope you can always trust me, even after what Naomi did with me. If I can ever help it, I will never hurt you. Or Sam. Never."

The other gave a nod, slamming down his beer and leaving the empty bottle on the counter as he pushed away from it with his hips, walking across the kitchen to Cas, taking the bottle away from the fallen angel and setting it aside. "I know that. Because like I said, I knew it wasn't you. It might have been your hands breaking my face, but it wasn't Cas. And I know I can trust Cas, because you did fight. I saw the connection break. I know what it was."

Castiel wavered, lips parted, staring at Dean in a shock of fear. This hidden thing, this deeply rooted beast he had kept chained to the deepest floor of his heart, Dean was letting it free. No pretense, no veiling, no coy glances anymore. Dean was coming at it head on. "I'm probably gonna die soon. Again. Maybe. I've been about to die or dying for too long and I'm sick of just sitting around on stuff that might be good things. Tell me, Cas, and don't fuckin' lie to me. Tell me the truth. It was me that broke the connection, wasn't it?"

Cas made a small sound at the back of his throat, wetting his lip before he nodded once. "When I said I needed you, that's what it was, wasn't it?" Another nod. "Why?"

Cas was trembling, realizing Dean was pressed against him, his hands on the counter on either side of Cas' body. "B-because..." He wet his lips again, Dean's eyes seizing his own and not allowing them to wander. The chains were free and the beast was climbing out of its pit. "Because I need you, too."

Such a long time coming, the beast ran out of the gate past the back of his teeth and when Dean closed the gates again with his own mouth, Castiel had to press his fingernails into his palm to know this was real. Such a distanced strange dance they had led for so long, in looks and faith and fights and uncertain trials of righteousness, beside each other, against each other, but never turned away. With his Grace filling up the body that was now only his, Castiel had been comfortable leaving well enough alone, to adore and protect Dean and let the other sit silent with the feelings he knew he shared because he was an Angel of the Lord and the wordless love in Dean's heart had been enough, even if they both had royally fucked up ways of showing it. Now, without his Grace and all its ascetic compassion, his human heart yearned to know Dean's love for him in blatant, hot sticky wet ways, in this kiss, in the way he had looked at him in his own t-shirt. It hungered to know with big neon signs.

He thought of the kiss with Meg in the brief part of his mind not overcome with the feeling of Dean's bowed lips on his own, but it compared like a flint spark in the darkness compared to a clear, glaring sunrise. His hands moved on their own, one to the small of Dean's back, the other to the back of his neck, into his hair, pulling him closer, as close as they could get, hips caressing each other through jeans like hands pressed together through a pane of glass. His mouth opened and he tasted Dean watered down with beer, his slippery wet tongue pressing to his own, stubble scratching his chin and lips soft as silk. His chest melted into a warm center of comfort and he knew he loved this man more than life, more than his Grace, more than God, just as his Father had asked.

Dean pulled away--it had only been a kiss, that eternity of perfect union, of acknowledged love, of tension resolved broken after only a few seconds--and pressed his brow to Cas'. "I don't just need you, Cas. And this life isn't easy or long, so before I die, or lose you again, for good, you have to know, I don't just need you. Castiel, I love you. Can't say how or why or how much, there aren't words for it, but I love you, as much as I've ever loved anything."

His lip quivered and Castiel bathed himself in those words, in Dean's big-boy set jaw, the vulnerability coloring his eyes a color of jade Cas wondered if anyone else had ever seen. He rubbed one of the hunter's earlobes between thumb and forefinger gently and let out a long sigh. "Dean... I've done a horrible job showing it, I know I have, but I... it's not even fair to say that I love you, too. It's so much more than that. I don't know if this will translate well for you, it's... it's got a special meaning for an angel, but, Dean, you're my faith. I've made so many mistakes, but please know that the intention behind them was good, and that my faith always came from you."

Dean gripped his hair and kissed him again, shorter this time. "I think I get it. But no more mistakes from now on. I told you, you come to me. I will help you, I will always help you, and I'll be there to keep you from ruining yourself."

"Too late," Cas laughed humorlessly.

"No. It's not. This is just the beginning for you, Cas. I feel like... maybe this is how it was meant to be for you all along. Human, I mean. It, uh... it looks good on you, actually."

Castiel felt his cheeks grow hot and he thanked Dean, shivering when he leaned down and gently kissed his neck.

"Now, you know me, I don't do this feelings and love crap, so... I'm sort of all out of vulnerability. But I mean every word of this, got it? I need you, and I love you, and I'm not gonna let you run off alone. Whatever's next for us, we do together, capisce?"

"Yes, I capisce." Dean straightened, but Cas kept his hand at the back of his neck, tugging him down for another kiss. The hunter softened into it, relaxing against Cas, losing themselves in one another, a slow meld of mouths and hands creeping across backs and arms. Cas started to feel a stir in his groin and Dean pulled away for air, eyes closed, his long lashes fluttering against his freckled cheeks. "You know, I'm... well, I'm still a virgin," Cas offered with uncertain leverage.

Dean kept his eyes closed, shaking his head. "Dude... don't tell me shit like that right now..."

"Do you not want to have intercourse with me?" Cas asked without thinking, confused.

Dean hid his face in Castiel's shoulder, laughing quietly. "I want to have lots of intercourse with you, Cas, but uh... let's just say I'm still warming up to that, all right? It's complicated. Human stuff. You'll get the hang of it." He pulled away and fixed Castiel's hair. "How about cuddling?" He pulled a classic Dean Winchester face with a shrug and all. "You look like you're about to pass out, and I am at least comfortable with cuddling. We'll start there and maybe, ah, work in intercourse later, around, y'know, curing demons and not dying and crap."

'Cuddling' pulled a stub of a file up in Castiel's brain and he had to do some quick mental research, finding old memories of watching Dean sleep snuggled up to a pillow, hugged against his chest. "Yes, I think cuddling would be enjoyable."

Dean winked at him, relaxed again, guiding Castiel by the shoulders back towards his room. "I'll warn you now, this isn't going to be some romantic get away for long. We're too close to slammin' Hell up for good to slack off now, so... this might, you know... this might be the most we get to pursue this, ah... development for a while."

Castiel stepped back into Dean's room, his favorite place in the world now, he was sure. "I understand." He turned as Dean closed the door and let the other tug him by the wrist to the bed, crawling under the covers with him. "I'm in no hurry. Only promise me, please, that you'll keep telling me that you love me."

Dean wiggled out of his belt and tossed it to the floor, clicking off the lights and curling himself around Cas, whose exhaustion was growing heavier by the second now that he was horizontal and laying on clean sheets. "Of course. You should know from now on, should have damn known all along, that every time I say your name, that's what it means. That I love you."

Castiel smiled, eyes closed, fitting himself against Dean's chest, laying his hand over the place his Grace had burned a palm print into Dean's flesh years ago. "Oh? And where do you come up with that?" He was fading fast, but listening as Dean got comfortable and whispered in his ear.

"Because that's what I hear every time you say mine."

.


	2. Hard on the Knees

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A series of fuckups leads to several leaps of faith, and one big step closer to slamming Hell.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This part is a bit slap-dash; I wanted to catch up as far as I could in preparation for the finale, working in all the parallels up to now. Intention is to have the next chapter up this weekend. Everyone hold onto their panties for Wednesday!

Sam dragged his feet into the library carrying a can of Cheez Whiz and a near empty box of Nilla wafers, holding them up at his brother, hunched over files with Castiel. Dean looked up, pulling his hand off of Cas' knee, bracing himself when he caught the haughty look of annoyance in Sam's eyes. "Go. Get. Food."

"We have food!"

"No, we have this. Just because you're a human garbage disposal doesn't mean the rest of us are. Besides, Cas needs his own supplies, some clothes that fit him. We're not making any headway on finding this demon cure on friggin' cheddar spray and cardboard cookies."

"Hey, that's a delicacy in some countries."

"Dean, go for a fuckin' supply run."

It had been three days since Cas had come to the bunker, three days of catching each other up on everything they knew, compiling information and researching with short, fitful naps in between. Three days of getting virtually nowhere and eating whatever was left in the cabinets. Dean had tried to feed Sam a half-drunk beer, three peanut butter cups, and a few strips of jerky for breakfast, and Cas had been wearing the same pair of Dean's jeans since he'd first put them on, switching out into a different t-shirt only after Dean had kept hinting passive-aggressively that the shirt was his favorite. As much as he felt tied down to figuring out the trial, he finally conceded that they were at an impasse, grabbing his jacket and giving Cas a pair of boots to wear, heading out to the Impala.

Dean drove towards Lawrence, taking the back farm roads faster than the cars a few hundred yards south were taking the interstate. Cas watched the corn and wheat rows fly by in the hot Kansas sun. He didn't have to ask why they were driving so far for supplies. You don't shit where you eat, and you don't go out to gather provisions near your super secret storehouse of metaphysical weaponry. Head down, eyes up, ass tucked in. Dean was sure Crowley had plastered it all over demon radio that the Winchesters were back in the number one spot on Hell's shit list. He and Sam hadn't shopped in the same town twice. Habits made trails and trails could be followed.

Their first stop was a Goodwill in a wilting strip mall outside of town. Dean walked the racks with efficiency, pulling t-shirts off hangers and shoving them at Cas, holding up pairs of jeans to the other's waist to make sure they would fit and not drag the ground like his own jeans on the other. In the end, Cas wound up with two pairs of boots, two pairs of jeans, four t-shirts, two overshirts, a mechanic's jacket, and a duffel bag, just in case their time camped out in the bunker didn't last and it was back on the road for them. When they were done, they walked down to the end of the row of shops into a Dollar General. Dean gave Cas the basket to carry and loaded it up with basic toiletries and plastic-wrapped packs of socks and underwear. The whole trip took only twenty minutes.

Even such a short time left sitting in the parking lot, the leather seats of the Impala were like laying down on asphalt in summer. Cas let out a soft groan, pressing back into the seat, the warmth soothing to tight shoulders and an aching back. His Grace had blocked out the tiny glimmers of mortal pain Jimmy's body had experienced while it was residing in it, but without the filter, Castiel was discovering the constant myriad of human pain. To live at all, something always hurt. Dean turned the engine over and swung the big boat of a car around in the lot, heading further towards Lawrence, finding a stretch of shops and markets and parking in front of a fried chicken restaurant. Castiel stepped out of the car and Dean walked around to him, taking off his watch. "You go rack up some supplies, it'll give you some experience shopping and dealing with money." He took Castiel's wrist and put his watch on it. The fallen angel tried not to shiver under Dean's touch. They had stolen kisses here and there and slept spooned against one another since his return, but as Dean had warned, there had been little further development between them. The trials were too important to become distracted.

"Meet me back here in half an hour, all right? Here's some cash. I've got to rack up on some ammo and see about getting you a decent gun. You're gonna ride with us without your angel-juice, we've gotta get you some fire power." He pulled a folded wad of bills from his pocket and pressed it into Cas' palm. "Think you can handle it?" His smile dashed Castiel's doubts that he would manage to fuck up such a simple task.

"Sure, I can handle it." They separated off into different directions, Cas heading to a small grocer and Dean down the street towards a pawn shop. Once inside, Cas realized he didn't understand human needs as much as he thought he might. He tried to stock his basket with things he'd seen Dean and Sam eat; eggs, lettuce, jerky, candy bars, a carton of milk, grabbing toilet paper when he passed it, knowing now how vital it was, but he felt lost, like a fish out of water, trying to compile a sufficient stock. Twice, he knocked things off of shelves, and he dropped the first six pack of beer he pulled from the fridge. People started to stare. He kept his head down and hurried over to the bakery. Cupcakes, cookies, scones... No pie. He felt even more like a failure.

By the time he had made it to the register, nearly all of the half hour was up. He gave the clerk the whole wad of cash and was handed back nearly half of it with his change. He wished Dean had come in with him, given him some pointers or guidelines, at least a list. Carrying the bags back to the Impala, no Dean yet, he loaded the groceries into the back seat through the cranked down window. The doors were still locked. He'd wait outside for Dean.

"Excuse me, sir, do you have the time?"

Castiel turned, looking down at the watch. "Ah, it's a quarter of an inch past three in the afternoon." He looked up at the small older man, a strange recognition flaring up in the back of his mind. The man smiled warmly at him.

"Hello, Castiel. Kevin's told me a lot about you. It's a pleasure to finally meet you."

Castiel's eyes shot wide open. "...Metatron?"

"Please, in public, it's Marv. I think you and I should have a chat. Grab a bite. To cut to the chase, we're quite similar, you and me. Free thinkers, on Heaven's most wanted list. We could have a very valuable friendship." There was a catch in there, Cas knew it, cutting his eyes up the street to Dean rounding the corner. "I know your Grace is gone, Castiel, and I'm very sorry for you loss, but you are still of Heaven, and now of Earth, as well. The fighting up there, it's been causing collateral damage. The two of us, we could stop it."

Cas was shifting nervously, watching Dean's step quicken towards them. "How? I don't know what you mean, I'm useless now--"

"Oh Castiel... you're the Keeper of the tablet. I'm its author." Metatron smiled like a politician. "We're practically a match made in... well, you know." Dean shouted Cas' name, breaking into a run when he saw Metatron reach out for Castiel's arm. "Let's do lunch."

"No--! Dean!" Cas turned to try and pull away, but his next step was onto the concrete veranda of a cafe overlooking the California mountains. "Dammit!"

Metatron was waving over a waitress to seat them, unbothered and relaxed. "Oh stop whining. I'll have you home before dark." He slid into a chair, spreading a napkin over his lap with another campaign-worthy grin. "Promise."

Cas refused to listen, threatened to start screaming and throwing silverware, if Metatron didn't let him use a phone to call Dean. He had to talk over Dean cursing to let him know he was all right, that he was coming back. He insisted that Dean get back to the bunker and continue their research and he would come back as soon as he could.

The conversation didn't go well. Cas declined to eat despite being hungry, too stubborn to accept Metatron's attempts at being cordial. "I'm out," he'd explained. "I'm not even an angel anymore, how am I supposed to close Heaven?"

"Because you're still /of/ Heaven. There's nothing saying it has to be an angel, anyway. I'm a secretarial class, Castiel. Even without your Grace, you're still the soldier here. We could save everything! All the mistakes you've made, they could be rewritten. At the very least, we could stop Heaven's petty killing from hurting everything below. Your boys are locking up Hell, let's put everyone in their rooms for a while."

Cas sat quietly for a long while, considering it. When he asked hesitantly what the first trial was, he immediately refused. Metatron shook his head, dabbing the corners of his mouth with a napkin. "I know it's not easy, but closing Hell isn't easy for Sam, either. You think something that dangerous was going to be a stroll through the glenn? Look, this was only a social meeting, I'm not going to force your hand. Think about it, wont you? If you decide you want in," he lifted his hand up, middle three fingers curled to his palm, and pressed it to his ear, "call me."

Castiel found himself flat on his ass, no chair under him and no California mountains. He smelled the water, though, and knew he was near the bunker.

It took another two hours to hike up the river. He hadn't been as near as he'd thought. When he banged on the door, Dean's arm shot out and yanked him in, locking it back and dragging Cas into the atrium. "The hell have you been, man? What did he do to you? Is Naomi pullin' his strings, too?"

Cas floundered, looking around. The place looked ransacked. Sam was slumped in a chair, nursing a throbbing headache. He looked ready to vomit. "I... I was only gone a few hours. I called you! Metatron, he zapped me out to talk, he wanted to discuss the angel tablet--"

"You've been gone two days!"

Cas felt his knees go watery. "I... what happened?"

Dean's anger cooled down and he grabbed them some beers, sitting at the table and shoving an ice pack at Sam for his head before he gave Castiel the rundown on what they had found; the film, the files, talking with Father Simon, being contacted by Crowley while raising Abaddon... and then losing her. "I don't think she took anything," Sam piped in, his voice soft and worn. He looked like hell. "We were just about to head out to Indiana, see if we can find Jenny Klein."

"We, hell. /I/ was about to go to Indy, and /you/ were gonna sit here not falling the fuck over."

"Dean, I'm fine, let's just get in the goddamn car and go before Jenny gets roasted."

Cas had stopped listening to them bicker, looking around the torn-apart atrium. He bolted out of the room and ran down the corridor to Dean's bedroom, digging through the bottom drawer of the dresser to the backpack he'd brought with him. Inside was his angel blade and--

No tablet. No fucking tablet. That demon bitch had the fucking tablet and now they were fucked ten ways from Sunday even more than they'd already been fucked against every odd.

Dean was coming down the hall after him, shouting, "Cas? Goddammit, Cas, let's go, what the fuck are you doing?"

Castiel got down on his knees and clasped his hands in prayer. "Metatron... I'm ready."

\---

Dean had been cursing at him for a good ten minutes now, mad at him for leaving them like that, for not consulting him at all before he'd rushed off to start the trials to close Heaven, but he'd been holding him the whole time, gripping him to his chest, his curses going from angry growls to weepy huffs of air against Castiel's neck. "We're so fucked... we're fucked, that's it. All of this is for fucking nothing now. You close Heaven if you want, but there's not a goddamn thing we can do about Hell anymore. We can't sacrifice those people."

Cas cooed to him, running his fingers through Dean's hair. "I know, I know... I understand. I'm sorry I left, but it was urgent I begun action to initiate the trials. If Abaddon has the tablet, who knows how little time we have before she finds some way to use it."

Sam's eyes were red-rimmed when he came into atrium, collapsing down into the chair. He watched Dean pull away from Cas with exhausted disinterest, shaking his head. "Like I haven't known..." he grumbled under his breath, pulling his phone out of his pocket. "Should I make the call?"

Dean put his hands on his hips, nodding. "Yeah... make it."

Sam hit the call back from Crowley's text and set the phone on the table, switched to speaker. Crowley answered on the first ring. "Hello, boys. I've been waiting by the phone for hours, wondering when you'd give a lonely bloke a ring."

"Cut the crap, Crowley," Dean snarled, glaring at the phone like his hatred might make it back across the line. "We're out. Let's cut this deal. You call off you kill list right now, we bring you the tablet."

"Oh, Deanie-Weanie, ever eager boy. Fine. I'll postpone my next slice-and-dice, let's get together and make it official. Somewhere sentimental. Uncle Drunky's old scrap yard. What's that drive, six hours? As a show of good will, I'll give you eight, so you can get all dolled up for me, first. See you bright and early, loves. And Moosey?"

Sam growled out a sigh. "What?"

"Eat a sandwich. I like my men with a little meat on their bones."

Sam jammed a finger at the screen to turn it off after Crowley had hung up, his jaw tensing. "This is shit..."

"Yeah, it's shit. But it's the only shit we've got to take." Dean squeezed Sam's shoulder before turning back to Cas. "Dude..." He surveyed the Nephilim's blood on Castiel's hands, up to his elbows. "Of course... you're still wearing my clothes."

Cas looked down at himself. "Ah... sorry."

"Come on. Let's get you cleaned up. Sammy, you get the car packed and fueled up, we're heading out in an hour, got it?" Sam nodded, hauling himself up and going to the armory. Dean started off towards the bathroom, Castiel close behind. When they were inside, Dean stripped Castiel down and used a damp rag to wipe off the blood, making sure none of it was his. Cas insisted repeatedly that he was fine, that he hadn't been hurt, but Dean checked him over, anyway, finally satisfied enough to push him over towards a shower.

Cas let the water run, smiling at the bottom shelf of the shower rack stocked with the toiletries Dean had bought him. He stepped in once the water was steaming and went to pull the curtain shut, Dean's hand stopping him, following him in. Cas felt a sudden rush of uncertainty and embarrassment, eyes running down Dean's naked body. Dean grabbed a bar of soap and lathered up his hands, forcing on a smile past the tension in his jaw. "What, I can't conserve water?"

Castiel grinned, taking the soap and beginning to wash his body. "How environmentally responsible of you." They crowded together and washed in silence, working around each other easily to reach shampoo and rinse. When Castiel leaned his head back to wash the last of the suds from his hair, Dean pressed up against his back, hands sliding around his hips to hug around his waist, lips dropping down to his shoulder. "Dean?"

The hunter's hands stroked across Castiel's stomach, kissing up his neck to his ear. "We're probably walking right into a trap, you know that?"

"Of course... what choice do you have?"

"I don't know, we've got a long drive, we'll figure it out. But if we're going just to have Crowley kill us, I'm not wasting this time with you. If you're uncomfortable, you can tell me to stop."

"I'm very comfortable."

Dean spun him and pressed him up against the tiled wall, sealing his mouth over Castiel's and fitting his body against the other's. Cas hadn't noticed that Dean was hard, but now his cock was nudging at his hip. A fire began to awaken in his groin and he wrapped his arms around Dean's back, his fingers wandering south and groping at the hunter's ass. Dean moaned appreciatively, sliding his tongue into Cas' mouth, his hips bucking forward when Cas sucked at it. They kissed and ground against one another, Dean reaching up to shift the shower head to keep a stream of water pouring between them. Cas was completely hard, letting out strained noises, confused by what he was feeling. "You've never even jerked off, have you?"

Castiel's face burned with shame and he shook his head, canting his hips towards Dean's, rubbing his dick alongside the other's. Dean gripped his hair and pulled his head back, dipping his tongue into his mouth again, this time with a distinct air of dominance. "It's all right. I'll make it good for you, I promise. Just trust me."

"Indefinitely."

There was a hesitance in Dean for a moment--just because he'd had plenty of sex didn't mean he knew jack or shit about having sex with Cas--but when his hand wrapped around Castiel's cock, it was sure, strong. Castiel wailed, pressing up against Dean, his hands going wild, clawing uselessly at the tile behind him. Dean shushed him, gnawing gently at his throat as he stroked him, slow and firm. "Don't fight it. It might feel like you're about to burst open or rattle apart or something, but don't fight it, just let it happen."

Cas nodded, mouth agape in a dumb expression of bliss. He let Dean work, jerking Cas off for a while before beginning to rub his own cock against Cas', then wrapping his hand around them both. Castiel watched his face, his green eyes down to watch what he was doing to them both, lips parted and swollen, his brows pressed together in concentration. He started up a rhythm with his hand and his hips and Castiel gripped Dean's shoulders, rocking with him, growing loud, moaning in Dean's ear and kissing his neck hungrily.

A tight pleasure that buzzed near pain coiled itself in Castiel's stomach. Dean's rhythm was growing faster, rougher, fucking him up against the wall of the shower hard enough to knock the knobs of his spine against the tile, bruising him. The roughness only set him on fire even more, raking his blunt nails down Dean's back, crying out in his ear, nipping and sucking at the faint scar of his hand over Dean's arm. When the tension mounted and then broke, he thought he was going to fly away, but when the stars cleared from his vision, Dean was still there holding onto him, hips rutting at his stomach, grunts muffled against his jaw. "Cas... Cas, baby did it feel good? Tell me it blew your mind, you look fucking beautiful cumming..."

Castiel bit Dean's shoulder gently, lazily working his hips towards Dean, sliding hands through his wet hair. "Amazing. Incredible. Like I was dying and then brought back to life. I want you to touch me forever, I feel like I'm going to die again for good if you ever stop touching me." He had gotten the lines right, Dean was keening in his ear in quiet surrender, shoving Cas back against the wall hard and kissing him roughly as he came in a sloppy, hot mess against his stomach.

His hips kept moving on their own, slow and erratic, for a while after he was finished, pressed against Cas, face tucked against his neck, hiding from the world in his warmth. Castiel stroked his back and cooed to him soflty, soaking up the afterglow, drawing the moment out as long as it could last. When Dean pulled away and began washing the cum off them both, Cas was smiling. Dean was not. "You're uncomfortable."

Dean looked up and flashed a quick grin. "Sort of. I'll get over it. Don't worry about it, you got me? This is... it's new for me and I'm still a little weird about it, but I'll get over it." He leaned in, kissing Cas gently, so different from the rough desperation he had exhibited on the other just a moment ago. "I love you, and I want to be with you. That felt fucking incredible and if we don't die, it's going to happen again, a lot, so... you let me deal with getting more comfortable with it, all right?"

Castiel nodded, squeezing Dean's arms. "Right. I can be patient, you know. Sex is still a, ah, newfound need for me."

Dean chuckled softly, nodding. "We'll figure this out. God, I hope we get the chance to... if Crowley stomps us out and keeps me from having something really good with you, I'm gonna be pissed, man."

Cas shook his head, smiling. 'Go into Hell with hope', they'd told him, armed to the teeth to seize Dean out of the pit. Here they went again, armed to the teeth, carrying hope.

Sam was just getting back from gassing up the Impala when Cas and Dean were dressed and ready to go. Sam gave Cas the front seat, explaining he needed to try and get in a nap. They started off towards the interstate and Dean leaned across Cas to the glove box to grab a map, brushing across his thigh in the process. Cas squirmed and fought down a grin, trying to keep discrete. Sam was still awake in the back seat, pretending like he was asleep, until a few minutes later when he really was.

They hit Nebraska and Cas and Dean filled the front seat with plans, some going right out the windows onto the road shoulder, others getting filed away to discuss with Sam once he was awake. When they were nearing the border into South Dakota, stopping for some food at a drive-thru that had just opened for breakfast, Sam woke up and got the debriefing. "That all kind of sounds like a crap shoot."

"Well, this is all one big shit show, Sammy. We in or would we really rather puss out?" Dean turned briefly to give Sam a stern look.

Sam sighed, shaking his head, trying to eat a biscuit, fighting with his weak stomach. "I didn't say I wasn't in, just saying it sucks."

"Yeah, but at least we're used to sucks. We're good at sucks... stow your crap in the overhead compartments, all right? Our ETA's about an hour."

They went over the plan twice more before pulling off on the long dirt road leading down to Bobby's. Sam's heart quivered to be back here, no house at the back of the lot looming sleepy-eyed over the lot anymore, just rusted heaps left to further sink into the dirt. He and Dean had played cops and robbers through the rows of paint-chipped bumpers, Sam had learned how to clean a gun in Bobby's kitchen, and Dean had fallen in love under the hood of the Impala in the garage, digging around in a stuffed-to-the-gills toolbox while Bobby had taught him how to fix her up. This place had a lot of them in it, more than any other one place in the world. Sam squared his jaw and steeled his nerves. This would be a good omen. This place belonged to them more than Crowley could use the sentimentality of it against them. They'd do this right.

Dean stopped at the last tree line before they turned the corner to the gate, reaching over to squeeze Cas' hand. "You be careful, you hear me? If shit goes sour, play it cool. Even if we sign over the tablet, we might be able to find a way around this. Don't go playing cowboy, all right?"

Cas took the gun from Dean and shoved a full clip into it, giving a single nod. "I know. I wont. You be careful, too." He turned in his seat to look pointedly at Sam. "Both of you." Opening the door, he stepped out, leaning in and looking at Dean. There was a short pause before Dean leaned forward, kissing him briefly. Sam looked shocked, but only for a moment, getting out and taking the front seat. "Good luck."

Sam gave Castiel a tight smile. "Yeah, you, too."

The gate was open, one side hung limply like it had been run with a truck. Dean crept the Impala around to the garage, stopping and cutting the engine in front of Crowley, standing in his suit, hands clasped in front of him, all dolled up in smugness. "Good morning, you handsome devils. Lovely day for a deal, eh?"

The brothers made their way around the car, standing in front of it, a good distance from the King of Hell. "Save the bullshit, Crowley. Let's see the goods."

"Not before you buy me dinner, Squirrel. Show me the tablet." Sam reached into his jacket. "Slowly..." Sam pulled it out fully until Crowley gave a satisfied nod before putting it back.

"The contract," Dean prompted curtly, not in the mood for Crowley's usual game of witty dick-fondling. Pulling out a scroll, Crowley tossed it towards them, letting the several yards of it unfurl. "Oh yeah, no hidden agendas in there."

Crowley smirked. "The highlights: You turn over the tablet and retire this notion of trials. I /don't/ crush you between my teeth, and stop systematically exterminating everyone you've ever saved. Sound about right?"

Dean pursed his lips, nodding, reaching for a pen in his pocket. "All right. Let's get it over with." He pulled the cap off but Crowley jerked back the end of the parchment sharply.

"Uh uh, hold it, milkshake. Moosey's doing these trials, Moosey signs."

Dean bristled. "Hell no, I'm not letting him sign this thing 'til I read the fine print."

Sam growled under his breath. "I've got this, Dean. If we don't do this, more people die. You'd sign yourself over to some hidden trick, but you wouldn't let me do the same?"

Crowley smiled, shaking his head fondly. "What's wrong, boys? Trouble in paradise?"

Dean shot him a look that told him to kindly go fuck himself. "No. But it might be trouble for you."

The sharp boom of gases expanding down a barrel rang out and Crowley dropped the scroll, gripping his arm. Cas rushed over from the garage, pulling the demon knife from his belt and wrenching Crowley up straight, putting the blade against his throat. Sam kicked the contract out of the way, marching over to them. "Devil's trap carved into the slug," Dean explained, crossing his arms over his chest and letting himself enjoy the look of "oh shit" painted vividly across Crowley's sweating face.

"Joke's on you," Sam spit, gripping Crowley's shoulder and digging his thumb into the bullet wound. Crowley cried out, a string of curses with Sam's name tailing on the end of them. "You're the third trial."

.


	3. Paved With Good Intentions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The gates of Heaven and Hell are ready to be shut, but at a cost. Who will pay the heavy price, and who can?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Holy falling angels, guys and gals! The finale really put me on my ass, especially with the plot I'd had laid out for this fic, but I sat down with pen and paper and watched the episode three times, and worked around the incredible plot points the canon story had to offer. From here on out, it's all speculation and original ("original") plot line, but I hope you guys enjoy the parallels to the actual show as much as I enjoy writing them.

Sam felt like the rattling of the spray paint can was the same rattle in the bottom of his lungs, in his knees. He'd told Dean he felt like they would win, that for the first time, he felt like they weren't doomed to failure, but he'd said that only for his brother's own good.

Crowley seethed in the chair, struggling against the chains and spewing curses at them. Dean hocked a thick gob of spit at his cheek, sneering. "You kiss your mother with that mouth?"

"I'll kiss your mother with this mouth, you inbred fucking moron! You think you can just nab the King of Hell? I know you're a Winchester, but I didn't think you were this bloody stupid!"

Dean looked as if he were tasting the insult, eyes scanning the ceiling. "I wouldn't call it stupid. I like 'ballsy', instead."

"I'll rip yours off and stir fry them, you little sh--"

Cas brought the hilt of the demon knife down at the crown of Crowley's skull, his eyes as hard as diamonds. "I'm growing sick of your noise. You'll only make this harder on yourself."

Crowley continued to hiss quietly about pretty boy angels needing a phallic obstruction to their big talk but Castiel ignored it, going over to Sam and surveying everything he had laid out for the trial. "Are you ready?"

Sam looked down at him, his face drawn and weary, more tired than Castiel had ever seen it, tired in a way that had to do with so much more than physical exhaustion. "As ready as I'll ever be."

Castiel pat his shoulder, trying to convey some sort of encouragment or strength, but he was depleted of both, himself. It had gone into the eleventh hour, and the three of them were running on adrenanline alone, on the need to finish the task. Sam took a deep breath to steady himself before he inched the needle into his vein, pulling back the stopper of the syringe. His blood ran thick and deep, the color of heart-meat. Cas could not help himself from watching the vial fill, shaking himself out of the bizarre trance when Sam pulled the needle free and turned towards Crowley.

Dean had shifted to the edge of the Devil's Trap, arms crossed over his chest. Crowley began to laugh, relaxing back into the chair. "Y'think you're going to cure me by injecting me with human blood, Moose? Where'd you read that, back of a cereal bo--AH!" Sam grabbed Crowley by the hair and wrenched his head to the side, jamming the needle into his throat.

Dean checked his watch, nodding to himself. "One dose down, seven to go."

\--

Two more doses and much anxious pacing passed. Sam was compulsively reading over Father Thomas' records. Cas caught Dean's eyes and directed him over to the antechamber of the church, closing the door behind them, leaving only enough of a crack to still hear Crowley grumbling to himself. "I don't know when Metatron will call for me. I hope we can finish this together, but I... it's hard to explain, I guess some part of me is still left, I feel like it could be soon."

Dean's mouth turned down at the corners and he reached out a hand to smooth it down Cas' arm. "It's OK. Ya done good, I think we've got it from here. I mean, it's really all Sammy from here. His blood, the exorcism, and bam, Hell's closed for business, right?"

Cas shrugged, putting a hand on Dean's hip and urging him a little closer. "I suppose, yes. That's the idea."

Dean tilted his head, leaning to nuzzle his nose to Castiel's. "What about you? What's next?"

Cas sighed deeply, looping his arms around Dean's waist, needing the closeness in some strange human urge for it that he had not yet pinned down. It seemed mechanically unnecessary and yet he felt as though he would not function effectively without it. "A cupid's bow. He's supposed to take me to the next assignment on the angel radio. After that? I don't know. I don't get any foreshadowing, just my immediate task."

"And you swear to me it's not damaging you like it's done to Sam?"

"To the best of my knowledge, I swear to you." Dean tipped his chin forward and Castiel bent to meet him, kissing him softly, feather light. The soft touch of plummage shifted to his hand. Cas pulled away, looking down, confused. Dean was pressing a feather into his hand. His own feather, a short, downy black one with a sapphire shimmer. Cas looked back up, brow creased in confusion.

"For luck." Dean kissed him again, tucking the feather into Castiel's jacket pocket. "Just in case."

Castiel wanted to argue that angel feathers had no fortuitous properties but he kept himself quiet. Dean had given it to him in a gesture of luck, of hoping he would return safe. He would accept it as such, and hope perhaps it might even serve its purpose. His mouth found Dean's once again, holding him tight. "I know this is the right thing to do, but I can't help wishing things were easier for us."

Dean smiled sadly, carding a hand through Cas' hair. "Me, too, baby, but that's life. I had to learn it the hard way, you will, too. Keep your chin up, all right? Eyes sharp, quick on your feet, and you come back to me safe, you got me?"

Cas' nostrils flared and he thought he might begin to cry in a moment. What a horrible human weakness, crying. He nodded stiffly, gripping Dean's shoulders. "I've got you."

"Good. Because I love y--"

"Hello again, Castiel. It's time." Metatron sat beside him at a lonesome country bar, somewhere in the muggy hotness of a Texas evening. He was cursing inside his head, he had been opening his mouth to tell Dean he loved him, too, and here he was, voice drowned out by liquor-swayed guitars and rattling deep voices full of love-lost sorrow. "I hope you weren't in the middle of anything." There was a tinniness to his voice and a mousy grin working under the scruffy beard that said he knew damn well Castiel had been in the middle of something and he didn't give a good goddamn. Castiel had been an angel, whether or not he was anymore. This was more important. /This/ was his family business.

Castiel sighed, shaking his head. "No. It's fine. We're waiting for the Cupid to show, correct?" Metatron nodded. There was a newspaper on the bar beside Castiel. He started rifling through it to the personal ads. "The faster this man can find love, then, the better..."

The bartender, their love-pending man in question, came to ask Castiel what he'd have. He spit up the first thing he could think of, what he heard Dean often order. "Double whiskey, straight up. Excuse me, do you think you'd rather like a partner or crime, or..." He looked back down at the paper, "nurse roleplay with light domination?"

The bartender gave him a warning look, mouth turning down in a tight line behind his beard. "Buddy, it's too early for this..." He turned away to get Cas his drink. Castiel sighed out through his nose, realizing the last ad had been a very blatant sex thing. He hoped one day he'd be a little better at knowing which ones were sex things so he wouldn't look so conspicuously helpless as a human.

Metatron was regarding him with deadpan astonishment. "You're not very subtle, are you?"

Cas shrugged, unable to explain himself and given no opportunity to. Naomi had appeared behind Metatron with three other angels, one of whom was grabbing Metatron by the shoulder, hauling him off the stool, an angel blade to his throat. Castiel jumped from his stool, his hand going to his own angel blade, which he had strapped to his thigh. "Let him go, Naomi."

Naomi's wide eyes remained stony as she tilted her head at Castiel, looking him over. "You're... hmm. Interesting. But I can work with this, too. You've ruined enough, Castiel, why don't you give up all these little tricks?"

The blast caught Castiel off guard and a piece of buckshot missed the angel holding Metatron and sank itself into his shoulder. He bit down on the inside of his cheek to keep from whimpering, lunging at the angel standing between he and Naomi, sinking his blade between their ribs, a bright light splitting out from their vessel. "Castiel, please, don't make this any worse!" Metatron pleaded as the angel who had been shot tossed the bartender into the beer cooler. In a whoosh that cut Naomi's startled barking of orders short, they were all gone.

Castiel's heart was racing, hammering against his ribs. He shoved the angel blade back into its makeshift holster and vaulted the bar, helping the groaning, groggy bartender to his feet. "It's going to be fine," he lied. "They're gone. Are you all right?"

The situation diffused awkwardly into a mundane evening, the bartender giving Castiel whiskey for free, insisting he had saved his life. Cas sipped slowly, feeling the burn start to dull his fingertips. He would need deft hands, perhaps, when the cupid arrived.

He was staring down into his glass thinking about Sam administering the fourth dose now somewhere across the country, of Dean worrying himself sick and trying like hell not to show it, when a delivery woman came in wheeling a hand truck of beer cases. /This is it,/ he told himself, /this is it, get ready./ He looked around the bar for the cupid, hoping like hell he could see it, wondering if without his Grace he would not recognize them. The woman had the bartender sign for the shipment and met one of the regulars, patting both the patron and bartender on the shoulders before she turned and left.

Castiel's heart sank. What if he had missed them? What if he was wrong? He was reaching for his phone to call Dean and let him know it was a bust, that he would get back to them as soon as he could, when he saw the patron and bartender fall into each other eyes like mesmerized children and realized what had actually transpired, and he was out the door as fast as his feet would carry him.

\--

Castiel checked his phone; it was flashing that the battery was low and he hadn't had the signal or the heart to call Dean yet. He had the bow, but he had no way back. He should have asked the cupid, but he felt it would have been too much, anyway, after carving the bow from her. He'd been walking these roads for hours. Sam would be giving Crowley the last dose soon. He wondered if he would feel it, if the gates of Hell slamming shut would send a wave of thunder through the world, if rolling clouds of screaming, clawing black smoke would sweep across the sky and down into the earth.

Probably not. He was human now. And if he had learned one thing about humans it was that they were blissfully ignorant of the dangers of the rest of the world, even the dangers lurking in each other.

"Castiel."

His hand had gone to the blade before she had even said his name, the whooshing like a trigger to his arm to put a weapon on the end of itself. Cas turned quickly, his mind processing the desperation with which she had said his name. The look on her face perplexed him just as much.

"He's tricked you, Castiel. We've been inside his head, this isn't a trial--"

"Why should I trust you?"

Naomi's face twisted, the horrifying power of the true form behind glinting somewhere beneath her expression. "You shouldn't. I've given you no reason to. But please, Castiel, this wont solve anything."

"This can save Heaven, or at least save the earth from it. It's the only choice I have."

"It isn't! It wont fix Heaven, it's going to break it! Haven't you considered why you kept your memories? Why you aren't changing with the trials like Sam did? This isn't a rescue mission, Castiel, he aims to punish us, for casting him out. He'll cast us /all/ out." The road was dark and wet and the moonlight cast a blue glow back up onto Naomi's face. In the coldness he had become accustomed to there, Castiel saw a sadness, a desperate need for trust that he had never witnessed on her visage. "Trust me, please. He's been lying to you. With Sam's trials, too. If he finishes this last one... he'll die, Castiel. Sam will die."

Castiel wavered, lowering his blade an inch. He didn't want to trust her as far as he could throw her, but he could see her true form behind the vessel and it made him know her words were true, as well. The blade went back and he grabbed Naomi's shoulder. "Take me to him."

The weightless rush startled him, it was still so strange in a human body. In his mind, he heard Naomi's voice tell him she needed to return to Heaven, to save Sam and pray for her if Metatron tried to call for him again, that she did not trust him to remain captive.

Castiel landed a few hundred yards from the church, full dark now with only the white-washed siding glowing dimly on the marsh. He broke out into a full run, not knowing how little time he might have, now. What if Sam was giving the last dose at this very moment? What if it was already done? His mind shook up the image of Dean sobbing over his brother's lifeless form, of Sam finally broken for good, and Cas ran a little faster. When he was close enough to read the Impala's license plate, he started shouting. "Dean! Dean! Stop him! Deeean!"

Dean came storming out of the church as Castiel was passing the car, slamming into Dean's arms to stop himself, gasping for air. "Stop him, dammit! Stop him, this trial, it's going to kill him if he goes through with it!" Dean took a moment to put the words together past Castiel's panting, but the moment they translated, he was churning up dust to get back inside. Cas stumbled in after him, hanging in the doorway, having winded himself completely, his nerves a crackling, anxious fire.

Sam's hand was dripping blood down onto the dirty floor, spotting around the Devil's Trap. Crowley looked pliant in the chair, eyes hooded, done fighting. A glowing that sang to the shining eye in Castiel's heart emitted from Sam's arms, infusing the blood seeping from the gash in his palm. It mesmerized him. "Sammy, no!" Dean stopped short when Sam wrenched up straight at the sound of his name, startled and hollow-eyed, looking half-mad and desperate for whatever he was feeling, whatever it was he was experiencing in that moment, to end.

"Sammy... Metatron lied. If you finish this trial, it will kill you." He waited poised like a bird on a fence, watching Sam's reaction. 

His wide shoulders heaved and he closed his fingers around the cut, his eyes searching the church for some kind of answer. When it finally came, Castiel watched it shatter against Dean like glass. "So?" He hung his arms limply, still glowing, a light churning just beneath his skin. "People are going to die if I don't do this, Dean. My life doesn't matter now. You know what I confessed in there? My greatest sin?" Sam's voice had gone thin and strained, but he pressed on, his eyes not leaving Dean. "How many times I've let you down. I can't do that again."

Even standing behind him, Castiel could tell how Dean's face was shifting, that his chest was tightening, his throat going thick. "Sammy..."

"I don't think I can handle you not trusting me again, Dean. Who will you turn to next instead of me? I'm supposed to be the person you come to, we're family. I won't let you down again. You'll be proud of me for this."

"Sammy, I am proud of you." Dean's voice was rough as gravel, having to push past the knot in his throat. "We've had our rough patches and I know I've said some shit that's set you back on your heels, but Sam... in the end, it's always about you. Don't you dare think that anything, past or present, will ever get put in front of you! It's never been like that, ever! I need you to see that, Sammy. Please... We'll find another way, it doesn't have to go like this."

Sam's lip quivered, streams of tears tracking down the dirt on his face. He took one step towards Crowley. "I'm sorry. I love you, Dean." Before Dean could lunge to stop him, Sam pressed his bloody palm to Crowley's mouth--Crowley's willing mouth, seeking forgiveness and cleansing--and a blinding light and lilting sound that threatened to push the nails out of the church burst from the two of them. Dean threw his arms up, dropping to his knees to shield himself. Cas tried to look on as long as he could, but it hurt and he pulled up his jacket to protect his eyes.

When the lilting frequency subsided back into the center of the room, the sound of shouting replaced it; Crowley, screaming at the top of his lungs for Sam, over and over. Castiel lowered his jacket and stepped into the room but all he saw were black spots swimming across his vision. He had to squint to focus.

Sam was sprawled on the floor, his head tipped back, eyes open and vacant. Already he looked so cold and pale and Castiel realized with a sharp stab in his ribs that he had looked like that even standing. Dean was trembling on his knees, staying back, afraid that this was real, that his brother was gone. They'd lost each other before, but this would be for good, he was sure of it. He would bury Sam and never see him again, he would never bicker or tease or make him a sandwich, he would never hear Sam's frustrated voice of reason from the passenger seat. Worst of all, even when Castiel came forward and laid his hand on his shoulder, he knew that, in his heart, he was going to always be alone. He and Sam had been everything to each other. He didn't think he knew how to be Dean without Sam. /Please, God,/ he heard his own voice begin to beg and his vision went shifty with thick tears, /please don't let him be gone. Not my little brother, not now. Please, Lord, don't do this to me./

Castiel crouched down beside Dean, shushing him in the sudden silence of Crowley, who had turned himself around to watch the window, the moon going in and out of view, thick black clouds racing across it, a rumbling starting somewhere deep in the earth. "Dean, I'm sorry... he's gone, Dean. And we have to get out of--"

He stopped short, both of them frozen, eyes on Sam. His foot had twitched. They were certain his foot had twitched. As they watched, his fingers curled. This his shoulders flexed back. His back arched. Dean took in a sobbing breath just as Sam did, rising off the floor and erupting in another sharp outpouring of pure light. Cas wrapped his arms around Dean, shielding them from it. Dean clutched onto him hard, hurting him, but he did not cry out. "S-Sammy?"

A long pause. The room had gone dark again around them. Heavy footsteps shuffled forward, only a few steps. Castiel heard a familiar rustling, but surely, it couldn't be... "Hello, Dean."

"No..." Dean pushed Cas' arms from around him, standing on shaky legs. "...Sam?"

Castiel looked up, stunned by what he saw... a halo, the shadow of wings, the keening Grace inside Sam he could not mistake. "O' praise you, Lord. Thank you," he breathed out in a mystified rush, ecstatic tears falling down his face. "Bless you..."

Dean took a step towards Sam, mouth agape, dumbfounded. Cas knew it was not only the shining heart that could see this new-found form. "Sammy, are you...?"

Sam held out his hands, turning them over, studying what of himself he could see. "I think I am. Dean... I'm an angel."

\--

"No! No no no! Put me back now! Now, goddammit!" Castiel clamped his hands over his mouth, horrified that he had taken the Lord's name in vain, in Heaven of all places, but when he looked to the desk and saw Naomi dead, he had more pressing things to be horrified about. "Damn you, Metatron! You tricked me! Haven't I suffered enough? Hasn't my guilt weighted me enough? Would you let it crush me, then will you be satisfied?"

Metatron approached him with an angel blade and Castiel realized he had been called into Heaven unarmed. He steeled himself and did not waver at Metatron's advance. "Oh Castiel... in time, you'll see this was the best thing for Heaven. What they deserved. Without God, the angels serve no purpose anymore. Besides, you're human now! You can wash your hands of all of this! You've been given such a great gift."

"...Fuck you." He fixed Metatron with a stare ripe with fury, his hands itching for a weapon. Metatron was smiling back at him and he wanted to pummel his teeth in.

"There's one last part to the spell. That's what it was, by the way. The trials, they were really parts of a spell." He held up the bow Castiel had acquired, had been keeping in his pocket. "The last thing I need," the blade arced down and sliced through Castiel's jacket, into his forearm, "the blood of a fallen angel." Castiel shouted, trying to wrench away, but he was only a man now and Metatron was strong, holding his arm out and letting his blood drip into a ceremonial copper bowl. "You hate me now, but you'll thank me later. I'm sparing you, Castiel. You've always had a good heart. You go back and have a life with Dean, a good life, and when you die and return to Heaven, tell me your story."

"I hope you burn, you--"

The landing was shit and he went down in the dirt, knees and elbows first. At least Metatron had dropped him closer to Sam and Dean than Naomi had. Dean was shoving Crowley into the backseat of the Impala and Sam was standing at the steps of the church, looking up, his mouth hung open in wonder. The signs of his Grace were fading to Castiel's eyes, but faintly, he could still see the halo circling Sam's head. "Dean..." He lifted his hand, a line of blood dried black from his hand up to his elbow. He pointed towards the sky. Cas jogged to Dean--it hurt like hell, he'd hit the ground hard and without bracing himself properly--following Sam's finger up into the clouds.

"Oh God..." Dean grabbed Cas by the shoulders to steady himself, both of them staring up. Rolling black clouds, demons, they knew, churned above them, and breaking through the corrupted souls' swarming, blotting out the moon, bright spots of falling light began to glint, breaking through the smoke, making flaming trails in the dark.

Sam was weeping, touching his face, not knowing why. "Dean, what's happening?"

Dean didn't have to ask. Castiel was limp in his arms, sobbing against his neck, his eyes on the sky, watching his brothers and sisters, wings ablaze, pulling from their backs, as they tumbled down to earth.

"The angels, Sammy... they're falling."

.


	4. One Mississippi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Down time is not taken for granted while a short calm follows the storm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After far too much time, I've come back with an update. Enjoy your porn interlude!

There was no plan. There was no other option. They rushed back to the bunker and strapped in to figure things out; Sam, Crowley, what would become of the angels, if Hell was shut for good or there had been a hitch in the plan. Kevin was a mess when they arrived, his hair sticking up at random from pulling at it. "Everything just went crazy! All this stuff, the map, it was lighting up like fireworks, the whole friggin' globe! What happened, what's going on?" When he saw Crowley trailing behind them and inside, Dean had to grab him around the shoulders to keep him from diving at the former King of Hell. "You brought him back here?!"

"Hey! Kev, it's done! He's cured!"

"That doesn't change what he did!" Kevin's exhausted face was drawn with anger. Crowley cowered behind Sam, head down, his hands fiddling nervously.

"He-he's right. I've done terrible things, and not being a demon anymore doesn't absolve me of any of them." Sam sighed, side-stepping Crowley so that he could not use him as a shield anymore. Crowley wilted, trying to fold in on himself.

Stepping forward, Cas put a hand on his shoulder. "This is a very complicated matter best dealt with with time and after sleep. A lot has happened and we wont know exactly how to move forward until the has dust settled. So everyone, stow your crap, and let's just get some rest."

Kevin pulled himself away from Dean, glaring pointedly at Crowley but letting it lie for now, stomping off towards his room. Dean grumbled something like "kids" under his breath and motioned for Crowley to follow him. "It ain't much, but until we know what's up and what to do with you, you're crashing with us." He head off towards one of the lower barracks halls so that Crowley would have space from the rest of them, especially Kevin.

Cas scrubbed his hands through his hair, dragging his feet into the kitchen and pulling off his jacket, wincing as he rinsed the gash in his arm under warm water. Sam frowned, finding the first aid kit in the top cabinet and pulling out bandages and sutures. "I, um... I mean not tonight, but... I really would like to talk to you, about... this..."

"Being an angel?" Cas grunted around a flare of pain as he poured whiskey over the cut.

Sam nodded, pulling a chair up to push Cas down into, the light over the sink the best to work under. Cas held his arm out and braced himself as Sam found a needle and some silk thread. "Do you feel different, emotionally?"

"Not really? But, I'm... I'm clean. And I'm healed. Shit, I even feel like I've put some of the weight back on. I feel... vast. It's... hard to describe."

"You don't have to." Cas bit down on his tongue when Sam started stitching him up--Dean's bandana wrapped tightly around it had been enough to keep him from bleeding out on the drive back but it still needed patching. "You're not like other angels, and now... you and Metatron are the only angels in the world. Well... and Lucifer and Michael, but, that's being a bit over-inclusive." He grabbed the whiskey bottle and slugged some down to numb the pain, Sam apologizing softly as he worked as quickly as he could to get it over with. "It will be strange, just as it's strange for me being human, now, but we'll figure it out. I'll do what I can to help you use your Grace, to discover it and how to control it. This is a blessing, Sam. And you're not dead, which I'm very thankful for."

Sam smiled, looking up at Castiel, reminding him gently to breathe. "Me, too." He went back to work, his hands ginger and quick. "I have to ask, and you don't have to tell me, 'cause he'd probably kill me, but... you and Dean... that's a thing now, right?"

Cas actually laughed at that, the laugh dying in a short cry of pain as Sam tugged the thread to tie it off and close the wound. "He'll probably kill me, too, for talking about it, but yes. It's a thing now."

Sam nodded, wiping down the closed gash, muttering, "finally," under his breath. Cas laughed softly, taking another swig from the liquor bottle before screwing the cap back on and leaving it on the counter. Dean was coming back from showing Crowley to his room, patting Sam's shoulder to tap him out.

"I've got him from here. You go get some sleep."

"Ah, can I even do that?" Sam asked, a twinge of fear in his voice, looking at Castiel.

Cas shrugged, feeling drunk now. "Try. You wont need sleep, but you can at least rest."

Nodding, Sam left Castiel in Dean's care, bidding them good night and going to his room. Dean crouched down in front of Castiel and clicked his tongue softly at the cut, his hands tender as he cleaned it thoroughly and began to wrap a bandage around his forearm. "Anywhere else you hurt?"

Cas pushed aside the neck of his t-shirt to show the sticky bloody spot where the buckshot had pinned itself into his flesh. Dean nodded, finishing up bandaging Cas' arm before carefully getting him out of his shirt, grabbing a pair of tweezers and letting Cas press his face into his arm while he dug the bead of lead out, cleaning the wound and slapping a big square bandaid over it. It wasn't so bad. He'd live. "How's your ankle?"

Cas shrugged, still holding onto Dean's wrist, not wanting to break contact. "All right, I guess. Hurts, but I can put weight on it."

"Good. I was scared it was broken." Not for the first time since his angel had returned without wings, he thought about the future Zachariah had shown him, and how Cas had told him about breaking his foot. He wondered if maybe Lucifer had been right, that no matter what details they altered, they would always find themselves back at that place. But he wasn't wearing a goddamn thigh holster like some post-apocalyptic douchebag, Chuck was probably dead, there was no Camp Chitaqua, no Croatoan virus. There was still a good year before he could dash that fear for good. They'd be all right.

Pulling Cas' good arm over his shoulders, Dean helped him up and took him to his room--their room--and helped him strip down and get into bed. They were both dirty and smelled but Dean didn't give a good goddamn. He stripped down and pulled Castiel to him in the dark under the sheets, tucked himself to the other's chest and fit his nose to the hollow of his throat, holding him. Castiel's breath smelled like a bar and Dean wanted to get drunk off his kisses, but he was tired and this, for now, was all he really needed. Cas' arms around him, all of them safe at home, and at least one decent victory in the damn bag for once in their lives.

There was a shit-storm of an aftermath to assess and deal with later, but for now, it was the sound of Cas' heart pressed against his own and sleep to the whoosing sound of his lover's breath. A hero's quiet, tender good night. He'd finally earned it.

\---

A meteor shower. That's what they were calling it, a freak storm and meteor shower. Some folks were calling it a sign from God but the official word was dismissive. There had been no major damage or prolonged issue. No one had seemed to notice a few thousand new people all of a sudden, either. Typical.

Kevin had been glued to Sam's laptop for two days, scouring news feeds and police blotters for any sign that closing Hell hadn't worked, or that the fallen angels were causing trouble. In disbelief, he determined that, for now, all was well.

Cas spent some time with Sam, quiet hours in the back of the library, telling him stories about the angels and helping him recognize his Grace, to try and weild it. Sam was hesistant at first but Castiel helped him use it enough to heal the cut in his arm. Dean asked after how it had gone, wanting a little explanation of his own, wanting to know his brother was OK, that it was still Sammy in there, but Castiel only smiled whistfully and assured him all was well.

After months of chaos and working themselves to the bone, the sudden slow pace was both a gift and extremely bizarre. In the afternoon of the third day after closing Hell, Dean found himself doing something he thought he'd never get the chance to do again; stretched out on his bed, Scorpions playing softly on the record player, shoving potato chips into his mouth and reading Cat's Cradle for the hundredth time. Not in a waiting room, not in the car while Sam was in a gas station, not in the fleeting moments here and there on a hotel bed, but relaxed and immersed in it without being rushed.

Every half hour or so, he would feel a panic rise in his chest, like he had forgotten something momentous, like there was something he should be doing, and when he realized that there wasn't, that he had every right to be doing nothing but enjoying himself, lost in his favorite book, he thanked God quietly that they had made it out alive.

Cas slipped into the room just as Dean was getting to the part most worn by his fingers over the years, passages underlined in pencil or pen or highlighted, the pages dogeared and bits of leaves and dirt huddled in between them. Dean closed the book around his finger and smiled at Cas, brows raised. "What's up, babe?" He was glad Castiel had not been adverse to his pet names. He didn't think he would have been able to keep himself from using them.

Cas looked flustered, shifting his weight around awkwardly through his hips. Dean tossed the chip bag off the bed, sitting up a little more. "I'm, um..." Cas searched for the right words. "I'm... horny? Is that what it's called?"

Dean bit the inside of his cheek to keep from laughing at him, behaving himself and nodding a little. "Depends. How do you feel?"

Cas sighed, exasperated, and climbed onto the bed with Dean, sitting on his knees. "Like I want to be touched. Like I want to touch you and put my mouth all over you." His hand went out and rubbed at Dean's hip through his jeans. He looked positively frustrated that he was feeling this way. Dean ate it up. "Can we watch some pornography?"

Dean couldn't hold back his laughter this time, snickering and tugging Cas in for a kiss, gasping when Cas took an inch and ran a mile, pushing him down against the bed and shoving his tongue in his mouth. Dean enjoyed it for a moment before putting a hand against Castiel's chest, pushing him back. "Slow down, baby. It's OK, we can go slow. It's better when you draw it out, anyway." He winked before rolling over and pulling his laptop from under the bed, opening it and letting it boot up. Cas was blushing darkly, sitting next to him, his back against the headboard.

"I'm sorry. I feel desperate for it. It's very strange, and very bothersome."

Dean leaned to kiss his cheek, grinning. "You'll get used to it." He pulled up his browser once the computer was running and clicked over to a free porn archive. "So... what did you want to see?"

Cas crossed his legs, shrugging. "Something with two men. I... well, I can't say I have many ideas of how sex works, in all practicality. I'd like to have some inspiration."

Dean thought that was fair. He went to the tags page and clicked on "gay", sorting the videos by rating and clicking on one at random. The video started in the middle of a longer piece, two moderately attractive men already fucking, the bottom bent over a table. Cas leaned in, fascinated, watching them. Dean felt oddly uncomfortable and turned on all at once. "Is that what you want to do to me?" Castiel asked seriously.

Dean cleared his throat, stalling. "Um... well, yeah, I mean... eventually."

Cas nodded, tilting his head and watching the gratuitous close-up shots of dick invading ass. "It actually looks rather enjoyable." The scene changed and they were face-to-face now, the bottom's legs wrapped around the top's waist. Cas shivered ever so slightly. "I think I would like that." He reached out and scrolled to the suggested videos beneath, clicking on another. Dean was slowly getting hard, not saying anything, letting Cas explore through the videos. Most of them were raw fucking, but Cas started to get into some blow job ones. When Dean noticed that Cas was licking his lips watching them, his dick throbbed in his pants. "I want to do that." Castiel pointed at the screen as a young buff guy swallowed a thick cock.

Dean blinked at him. "OK... um, like, now?"

Cas nodded, pushing the laptop to the end of the bed, the video still playing. "Yes, now." His hands went to the front of Dean's jeans and started to pull them open.

Dean grabbed his wrists. "Woah! Hey, come on, I said slow. Trust me, it will make it better." He pulled Castiel's arms up and encouraged him to put them around him, tugging Cas to his chest and kissing him, fighting to take dominance and make it relaxed, bleeding the urgency out of it. Castiel fought him for a moment, but gave in, following Dean's lead. "That's better," Dean grumbled against his mouth, content to have Cas not pushing him. He wanted this time, he didn't want them to get thrown into some fuckfest with each other. Not yet, anyway. There would (hopefully) be time for raunchy quickies later. He wanted to use the times they had together now to learn Cas, for them to get to know one another in this new way.

Rolling, Dean sat in Castiel's lap, letting out a loud moan when the other broke away to kiss his throat, sucking at his Adam's apple and biting along his jugular. Was he really that obvious? Was it so easy to find what got him going so fast? Maybe Cas really was just that damn good for him. He rocked in Castiel's lap and enjoyed the attention, huffing and groaning, gripping at Cas' hair and panting out dirty words of approval.

When Cas started tugging Dean's shirt off, he let him, pulling Cas out of his, stretching out on top of him and pressing them skin to skin, gasping when Castiel grabbed him and rolled them over, working his hips in short cants against Dean's thigh, kissing him a little more roughly. Dean sighed at how good it felt to have Cas on top of him, the solidness of his weight, the heat of his body. He let him have his way for a moment before he pulled back and had to slow him down again, kissing over his face and jaw, rubbing his back. The porno at the foot of the bed was still moaning at them and Cas' breath was short and hot, tucked against Dean's cheek. "Shhh, you're all right. You know I won't leave you unsatisfied."

Cas nodded tightly, pulling back a little, sinking onto his side against Dean, rubbing a hand up and down the other's ribs. "I'm not used to feeling this way. It's... an urgency in me."

Dean kissed his brow, popping open the button of Castiel's jeans. "I know. I want you, too, baby. Just cool it down for me, draw it out. We'll make this last."

Castiel nodded and gasped when Dean reached into his pants and fondled him, his blue eyes rolling back in his head, closing. He was so hard and there was a wet spot of precum in his underwear, Dean almost felt sorry for him and thought he should just blow him now, but watching his throat work as he continued only to palm him kept up his resolve. He leaned forward and bit his shoulder, kissing up his neck, sucking at his earlobe. Cas reached to tug Dean's pants off, wanting all of him on display, and Dean didn't stop him.

Cas was out of his own pants before Dean knew he was even stripping, crouching over Dean and kissing his chest, gnawing at his nipples until Dean was squirming and begging him to stop. Castiel stowed away a strange pride in making Dean beg that way, in working him up. He didn't quite understand the feeling but knew it was a good one, that it made him move down, made him kiss and bite along the peaks of Dean's hips, wriggling his tongue along the sensitive flesh and making Dean's back arch tight.

When he first put his mouth on Dean's cock, he felt like he heard his name for the first time. Dean's voice was thick with pleasure and strained, a pleading behind it, an appreciation accenting the vowels. He'd used his full name. Castiel liked that. He didn't know what he was doing--the porn had stopped and he hadn't been watching too closely for technique--but he did what felt right, using his tongue creatively in ways that had Dean panting for him to wait, to stop for a moment.

Cas sat up, his mouth making a soft 'pop' around the head of Dean's cock and he looked over the hunter, spread out, chest heaving, a flush coloring down his face to his throat, over his chest. Dean grabbed Cas' hip and pushed him back, rolling over onto him, his dick in Castiel's face and Cas' in his. Dean began to stroke him, nervous to suck him but determined he would do it, especially when Castiel took him into his mouth again and sucked with abandon.

Dean closed his eyes and hung his mouth openly dumbly for a moment, enjoying the hot warmth of an unskilled mouth around him before he squeezed Cas' cock around the base and leaned in to kiss along the shaft. His technique was halting and awkward at first, but when he slipped his lips around the head and swirled his tongue, Cas bucking under him was enough to let him relax. He was good at this. An explosion way off in the back of his mind reminded him of why, of the years he'd spent playing whore to Alastair, even after he'd taken the deal. He hadn't thought about that in a very long time, would not let himself dwell on Hell whenever he could help it, and the explosion faded away on the horizon of his mind, leaving only a hard-won skill.

The taste of Cas grounded him in such a strange way. He tried his best not to make a mess or a fuss about his conflicted sexuality (a good portion of the smoke cloud from that explosion had hinged on part of the torture pointing out that he /liked/ a dick in his mouth) and as much as it had knocked his knees together starting out with Cas, in the moment of it, it felt too good to care. Labels were clumsy. Hunter. Brother. Lover. Those were easy. Those fit, they described what he did, what was important. Everything else could sit down. And Cas was his lover now. That fit even better.

He was proud of Cas for not going crazy. He'd expected to get choked with bucking hips, but Cas only rolled up into his mouth, moaning around his dick. It was too delicious for words. When he was getting close (for an Angel of the Lord, Castiel had a natural talent for sucking cock that whittled Dean's stamina back about twenty years), he pushed himself up on his hands and panted, watching Cas under him. He gave an experimental push down and watched Cas' throat bulge. He gagged slightly, but didn't pull away. Dean did it again. Cas only moaned. "Is this all right?" he asked, slowly thrusting into Castiel's mouth, fascinated by his own member disappearing past those lips, and Castiel only squeezed his thighs in response. It was more than all right.

Dean was easy on him at first, but from the clawing hands at his ass and hips, it was clear Cas was getting /off/ on this. He urged Dean on until the other was fucking his mouth mercilessly, tears streaming from the corners of Castiel's eyes, but he wasn't pushing Dean away. Hating to neglect him, Dean kept jerking him off, balanced awkwardly on a hand and an elbow, biting his lip when he couldn't help from grunting. "Cas, I'm gonna cum. Can I? In your mouth?" His words sounded broken and stupid to his ears, but he didn't care, he was so close. Castiel squeezed his hips again and Dean let out a relieved moan, thrusting down his throat only a half dozen more times before he was gone, pressing his face into Castiel's thigh to muffle the long, shaking sigh of pleasure that left him, whimpering when he felt Castiel swallowing down every bit of it around his dick still shoved in his mouth.

The afterglow was dizzying, especially with Castiel still sucking him lazily. He had to hike up on his knees and pull out of his mouth, too flummoxed to explain he was so goddamn sensitive it hurt, and Castiel almost protested before Dean was swallowing him down again. Castiel's hands clutched at Dean's leg, pressing his face against his skin and panting, moaning, nibbling as Dean paralyzed him with pleasure. It was fascinating and deeply erotic to have the other beneath him discovering sexuality, to be teaching him. It made his veins burn hot to think that Castiel had spent eons not needing the pleasure of sex and to be the one now to introduce him to it, to pleasure him.

He didn't warn Dean before he came, Dean suspected he still didn't really know when it was coming, but Dean was at least prepared after the spike in moans and bites and pleas of his name. He sucked until Cas' cock stopped twitching, pulling back and yanking a tissue from the box, spitting Cas' load into it and tossing it into the bin beside the bed. Moving to shift away from him, Dean let out a startled gasp when Castiel grabbed him roughly by the hip, then the shoulder, and shoved him onto his back, crushing a kiss down against his mouth.

Dean felt like he'd been snatched up by a fighter plane, hardly able to keep up with Cas. He still had his eyes shut and his lips parted uncertainly when he realized Cas had pulled away again, whispering "thank you" to him. When he opened his eyes again, Castiel was at the foot of the bed, cross-legged and leaned over the laptop, hunt-and-pecking into the search bar of the porn site.

The afternoon went on like this for another hour or so. Castiel was fascinated with the pornography, especially with penetration, asking Dean what it felt like until Dean conceded to finger him. That skill, at least, was one born of high school bleachers and his dad's borrowed back seat. There wasn't much of a difference, or at least there wasn't from the way Castiel was moaning underneath him. Dean got lost in watching his face--his hand knew the routine well enough--and thinking that the man lost in sexual abandon under him, gripping his arm and gasping his name, spreading his legs wider and curling his toes to have Dean's lubed fingers roughly fuck his body he was only just discovering, that man had been an angel. When Dean leaned forward and sucked a hickey just behind Cas' right ear, the other lost it completely, sobbing out his pleasure and cumming hard, making a royal mess.

Dean cleaned them up, realizing he was hard again. Castiel was a wreck. Dean felt like he had opened a door inside him, a pit that had been growing and kept locked with Grace filling up his body, and now it needed so much more. He seemed so unashamed of his needs, confused and uncertain of what was happening, but completely accepting of the pleasure and finding what got him off, what he enjoyed. There was not a single ounce of shyness when he took Dean by the shoulders and pulled him down against him, kissing his face and whispering to him, "Dean, hold me down. Fuck my mouth."

Dean thought again that Castiel only a week before had been a hurricane bottled up in a man. The blinding light, the scar on his shoulder, his raising from Hell and so much more, that had been Castiel. Knowing that all along, maybe that's what had kept him at bay before. The looks they shared, the few spared touches, the fights, the sacrifices, everything, it had gone without acknowledging the source between them because Castiel had not been the man, he had been the blinding storm inside, a wave of celestial intent, and Dean could not imagine such a thing loving him back, such a thing knowing how to love a broken man like himself. Now, the hurricane was still in his gaze, the fire of Castiel, soldier of Heaven, still burned inside him somehow, but he was just a man. A man whose eyes watched wantonly up at Dean while the hunter tenderly fucked his mouth.

The submission was glorious and beautiful. Even without his Grace, Castiel was strong. It turned Dean on more than he'd like to admit, really, knowing Cas was capable of overpowering him if he wished. The fact made it only more incredible, then, how completely Cas was giving over to him. Dean's knees were fit against Cas' armpits, his hands holding down the fallen angel's wrists, and he could not stop staring into those eyes as he worked himself to the edge, shoving into his mouth. He could tell Castiel loved it just as much, his eyes fluttering shut now and again, little moans coming from him even when the blunt head of Dean's cock choked him.

Castiel swallowed again, like he didn't even have to think about it, and Dean filed it away to tell him later how hot he thought that was. He let go of Cas' wrists and crawled backwards away from him, collapsing down against his side and curling up, their skin damp and sticky, pulling at each other. Dean didn't care. He laid his head against Cas' chest and closed his eyes when the swell of something big and scary and warm filled his chest as Castiel's arms wrapped around him. This was an affliction Dean didn't think he would ever be cured of, to love someone without fearing they would be taken away from him, to hurt as he loved them. He tucked himself against Cas and they laid together listening to one another breathing, their carnal urges satisfied for now.

Castiel's fingers started to stroke idly through Dean's hair. Dean bit his lip when Cas leaned to kiss his head, squeezing him around the waist a little. "I love you." Dean bit his lip harder, nuzzling his nose against Castiel's collarbone. "More than the stars in full darkness. More than the way it smells before a rainstorm. More than flying. More than the way the sunlight looks in autumn. More than my Grace." With each inferior love, he kissed Dean's hair, petting his neck and shoulders. Dean clenched his jaw against the stinging in his eyes that had started. "Dean Winchester, I would not dream of being anyone else's lover."

Dean choked a little and tried to laugh it off, leaning up and kissing Castiel's chin. "Have you been reading Sammy's chick books?"

Castiel smiled, not offended by Dean's deflection. He knew better. "Perhaps..."

Dean kissed his mouth, a short, comfortable kiss, laying back down against Castiel. They laid together this way, unspeaking and content, until the sweat dried off their skin and chilled them. Castiel pat Dean's shoulder, prompting him to sit up. "I'm hungry. I'll make us sandwiches."

Dean bit his lip for different reasons all together as he nodded and watched Cas cross the room naked to put on his bathrobe. He wanted to protest, knowing how obvious it would be to everyone else if Cas, muss-haired and sporting faint bruises around his neck, went to make lunch in his robe, but he laid back down. They couldn't pretend to be having platonic little sleepovers forever. He didn't think that at least Sam was that dumb, anyway.

Castiel didn't realize that he was humming when Crowley came into the kitchen, carrying a thick tome of thirteenth century angel lore and an empty coffee mug he intended to refill. It was awkward, and awkwardly comfortable, to have him around. His posture alone showed such a significant change in him, not to mention the fact that he was barefoot and wearing only a t-shirt and dark sweat pants. He gave Cas a sheepish smile as he pulled the pot out from the coffee maker, then tilted his head, studying Castiel. "I'll be damned... you really are fucking him." He balked when Castiel shot him a guarded glare, as if realizing he'd actually said it out loud. "Ah, sorry..." His accent was more American, his voice softened. A different man all together. How strange... Castiel wondered how much he had changed, if at all, beyond the obvious, beyond his very essence of power and being void of him.

Cas softened, sighing as he turned back to the sandwiches, cutting them in half, diagonally. "Is it terribly apparent?"

Crowley wrinkled his nose and tapped the side of his neck where Cas had a particularly dark mark. "A bit, yeah."

Castiel shook his head, sighing again. "Oh well. So much for discretion." He had picked up the plates and was turning to leave the kitchen when Kevin came sprinting in carrying a laptop, Sam on his heels.

"Bad bad bad! Very bad! We have a situation!" His voice cracked, but he was holding it together, a hard set in his eyes that didn't belong there if it hadn't been for the last year or two of hell. He set the laptop down on the counter and Cas put the plates back, jogging down to the hall to lean out and call Dean's name before returning to the others. Kevin was already explaining everything in a rush. "It didn't seem too weird at first, just a diner robbery, but there was a clip from the security camera on one of the local news sites..."

Dean was coming in, buttoning his jeans as he rounded the corner into the kitchen, asking what the hell had lit a fire under their asses, as Kevin hit play on the video. The five of them stood around holding their breath, save for Kevin, who was still panting like he had just sprinted a mile.

The black and white grainy footage was shot from the back corner of the diner, facing the counter. A woman walked in with an over the shoulder backpack, wearing dark jeans and a leather jacket, her hair up in a bun. She walked up to the counter and reached across to grab the waitress poised to take her order by the hair and slammed her face into the Formica before pulling a pistol from the inside of her jacket, a real hand canon of a thing that rained down ceiling tile when she fired a warning shot. People scattered, going for the door, but it was suddenly locked. The woman was shouting something at them, but the audio was garbled and overmodulated with frightened screaming.

It was then that she turned and walked to the corner with the camera, climbing onto the table nearest it. Her eyes were full black. "Hell on Earth," she crooned, smiling into the camera as she swung the gun back behind her, firing blindly into the crowd of people trying to bash down the door. "Party of one."

The video stopped and Kevin was talking in a rush again. "What the hell was that? Why is she still up here, did it not work? Who is she?"

Sam's jaw was working anxiously and Dean could hear him grinding his teeth. "It's a message. For us, I'm sure. For everybody, maybe."

Kevin tried to steel himself, tried to keep it cool. "Who is she?"

Sam finally spoke, fists clenched by his sides, staring at the frozen image of the smirking face on the screen. "Abaddon."

.


	5. Mysterious Ways

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The boys hatch a plan and start off after Abaddon, working out her next move and trying to keep two steps ahead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At last, another chapter! This one is a little rough, I had a lot of information to shove into an already long piece, but I hope you all enjoy the developements. Cheers!

Dean's brain was running high octane, fast and wide open. If Abaddon was still shit-kicking around upside, who else might be? Sure, the bitch had said 'party of one', but he wasn't going to trust a demon any further than he could throw her. The diner snafu had gone down outside Manitowoc, Wisconsin, but there were already reports of having sighted Abaddon through Ohio and Pennsylvania. "We sleep on this," he announced, hard and level. It didn't sound good to him, either, but he knew they couldn't push their luck. Diving in head first on Lucifer's own little foot soldier would be a classic fuck-up move. Sam started to protest but Dean put his hand up, realizing he was still shirtless with Cas' bitemarks on his shoulders. "No. We get prepared. Everybody get a few good hours, we get him," he pointed to Cas, "suited up and ready to ride with us, and we figure out where this bitch is headed. I'm not taking chances on this. This is a loose fucking end on a big goddamn rope, all right?"

Kevin was the first to follow orders, closing the laptop and heading back towards his room. Crowley took a few dumb seconds to stand around looking rattled before he followed suit, followed orders, and went on his way. Dean took Sam by the shoulders, trying to look like the sure big brother and not as shakey as he felt. He'd wanted this done, wanted it over, book fucking closed, but he should have figured it wasn't that easy. It never was. "Trust me on this. If she's trying to get our attention, let's make her be a little louder. Maybe weed out her next move."

"Dean, people are going to die--"

"They wont." He held Sam's gaze, those scared, love-everybody puppy eyes he'd had to ward himself against all Sam's life. "They wont. If she's running solo, she isn't going to draw any more attention to herself than what she needed to get ours. Four hours, that gives us sunset, we head out, you got me? But not before then, not without a plan, and not without making sure our asses are covered. We've gotten lucky up to here, Sam. I'm not gonna take that for granted."

Sam pursed his lips, a worried crease cutting down his chin, but nodded, shaking Dean off. "Fine. Got it. See you in a few hours."

He gave Cas a tight smile over Dean's shoulder before turning and going back to the library, probably to see what he could dredge up about Knights of Hell. Dean was about to call him on it and send him to his room before he remembered that Sam didn't need to sleep anymore. A strange pang rippled through his chest and he pushed a hand back through his hair, turning around and giving Cas a weak grin, the other holding the plates of sandwiches, trying to smile back at him. "We should go get some rest?"

Dean nodded and grabbed two beers from the fridge, heading back to his room. They sat in bed and ate in silence, draining beers in record time before fitting against one another in the dark. Castiel laid perfectly still for all of fifteen seconds before shifting, his hand going to the small of Dean's back, drawing him closer. "I have a theory," he offered into the darkness and Dean imagined his half-lidded eyes and his chapped lips moving. "About why Abaddon is still on earth."

"Oh yeah? I'm all ears."

Cas' fingers trailed along the small of Dean's back. "The tablet. She had a backpack in the video, she must have had it on her when Sam closed the gates. It must have... I don't know, cloaked her, kept her from being pulled out of her vessel."

Dean thought that sounded a lot less angel-mumbo-jumbo than he was used to the things that usually came out of Cas' mouth, but it wasn't a terrible theory. It was better than "the trials didn't work", at least. "Sure, OK. Let's run with that one. She got to pass 'go' 'cause she's got the Word of God in her back pocket, great."

"It has to be something with the tablet. It called out to me, it's powerful. I can't explain it..."

"You don't have to, baby, just get some rest." They both closed their eyes for a few hours, but Dean doubted either of them slept. He felt worn out when his phone started playing an alarm. He shook Castiel awake and went to make a pot of coffee, Kevin already up with Sam, trying to trace any sign of Abaddon. "Text me if you find anything," he called to them, carrying two mugs of coffee back towards his room. "I'm gonna give Cas a little firearm run. Let's be ready to head out with some sort of plan in an hour."

Castiel was already dressed and wide awake when Dean made it back to the room, handing him a cup of coffee and leading him down to the firing range.

"This is a .30-30," Dean explained, pulling a rifle off the wall before the banks of flourescent lights had even finished flickering on. Cas followed, watching as Dean flipped open a box of ammo, loading the weapon. "Now, it's lever action," he cranked down the back of the trigger guard and Castiel watched a round slide up and into the chamber. "She's ready to go now. Look easy enough?"

Castiel nodded and followed Dean over to a firing lane. Dean raised the gun and titled his head to sight the shot. "She's loud, OK?" He fired once, the solid recoil a strange comfort against his shoulder. A clean hole sat in the center of the target head. He handed the rifle over to Cas, who butted it up against his shoulder, Dean cupping against his back. "She'll kick, so keep it steady and be wary of it so the barrel doesn't fly up. It might take some getting used to, so just--"

Castiel fired once, wrenched down the lever, twice, cocked it again, three times. Dean had flinched away, not prepared, himself, to be that close to him when he fired. He stood blinking for a moment as Castiel set the rifle down and pressed the button to retrieve the target. There were three new holes the size of nickels in the cinder blocked back wall of the range. "Goddamn," Dean whispered, seeing the three tight shots clustered together dead center of the target's chest. "Is there uh... there somethin' you wanna tell me, Cas?"

Castiel looked confused, squinting at Dean. "I think Jimmy bird hunted with his father. It felt... natural?" He pointed back at the paper target. "I thought this was good."

Dean blinked, nodding along. "Y-yeah, no, it's great. Just wasn't expecting that. And now I'm turned on." Castiel smirked, not helping Dean's situation at all. "All right, then eagle-eye. Let's see how you are with a shotgun."

Castiel's accuracy and unflinchingness persisted, but Dean could see that the rifle came easiest for him. "Good. That eases my mind. I've got some special rounds I've been playin' with, I'll load you up with those and we'll put a hurtin' on this bitch." He pointed to the gun as Castiel followed him to gather up ammunition and clip a strap onto the rifle. "That was my dad's, y'know. I've always been partial to a pistol, so it's good to see somebody using it." Cas smiled and Dean thought it was the first time in a long time he'd seen hope in his eyes. "We've got some bullshit work to do to get you ready for this, so bare with me, all right? First thing is an ID. You're gonna need one anyway, we might as well make it now." He'd become quick at putting them together, and Charlie had sent him a nice present in the mail for making pretty damn good ones.

Cas followed him to the small room Dean had put all their alias business in, standing still when told so that Dean could take his picture. He sat beside the hunter and watched him pull up the photo on a computer and start putting together some information. 5'11. 175. Blue eyes. He smirked at Dean pulling an address out of his ass, 3984 Bird View Ln Caldwell, NM 87747. "What do you want your birthday to be?" Dean turned to Cas and made a face. "Do you /have/ a birthday already? I figured not."

Castiel shook his head, thinking about it. "January 4th, 1973." That was the year Jimmy had been born.

Dean typed it in, smirking, muttering under his breath, 'looks like I'm into older men'. "Any particular reason for that day?"

"Well, it's a Thursday. There was a solar eclipse that day, as well. And it's under the sign of Capricorn. Father made part of me from the starlight of that constellation." Cas thought it was as good a day as any other. He'd never known the Winchesters to celebrate birthdays, anyway. It was just a number on a piece of plastic to make other people think he was a certified human being.

The hunter smiled a bit at the explanation before turning back to the screen. "What about last name? You wanna use Novak?" Dean was already typing it in.

Cas bit the inside of his lip, thinking about it for a moment. "Ah... could... well, would you be all right if I used Winchester?" It sounded even more stupid coming out than it had in his head. Dean stiffened for a moment before turning to him.

"Seriously?" Castiel gave a sheepish nod. Dean pulled out his phone and typed out a quick message to Sam. /making cas ID. he wants to use winchester. u ok w that?/

Sam responded almost immediately. /Sure :)/ An angel and he still used those damn emoticons...

Dean backspaced through Novak and put in his own name, looking over the information. He selected a New Mexico ID template and had the card printed in less than a minute. "Well, there it is. Official. Mostly..." A fake ID was as good as any, in his book. After all, after his birth certificate, there wasn't much real on record for Dean, either. His fall-back "real" identity had been Vincent Maple for about five years now, anyway. All the same, he had to push the bird battering against his ribs back down that Cas had wanted to take his name. Sam's name, too, he had to remind himself. They were family. He'd told him that, he meant it.

Cas took it and looked it over. He was glad Dean had not asked if he wanted a different first name. Castiel was more than a name, it was like his own personal talisman, the last piece of him that was purely of Heaven. Seeing it written out on the mundaneness of human identification felt strangely right. He put it in his pocket and followed Dean back out to get weapons together and start to load up. Sam caught them as they were putting together a cooler. "Looks like she's on a path down the east coast. If she keeps her pace, we can probably intercept her somewhere in the Carolinas, maybe Virginia."

"Anything big?"

Sam shook his head. "Just sightings. One drive-away from a gas station."

"What's she drivin'?"

"White Jeep, there wasn't anything much more specific than that." Nodding, Dean handed Cas the keys to the Impala. "You start loading her up, we'll be out in a minute." Kevin came bounding in from the atrium, wearing black jeans and a plaid button down, the pistol Dean had given him for protection at the boat house tucked conspicuously into his waistband. Dean's shoulders went limp and he looked up at the ceiling as if for help. "Oh hell no."

"Dean, I--"

"Nuh uh, not a chance, go sit the fuck down right now or I swear I'm tying you down and leaving you here."

"Dean!"

Sam stepped between them before Dean could rag on Kevin anymore. "Look, we need you here, Kev. You're our command center, got it? We're going to be on the road for at least twelve hours, we need you tracking her so we can change course if we need to. You're our brains in this, you got it?" Kevin clenched his jaw hard, puffing himself up in front of Sam, but it was useless. All his fight bowed down to reason.

"Yeah, OK... fine. Fine. But what about Crowley?"

Dean slung his duffel over his shoulder, reaching to take Kevin's gun, putting it up in a high cabinet in the kitchen. "When he wakes up, you make him your gopher. You're gonna need lots of coffee, kid. I know things ain't easy between you two and I promise we'll release his sorry ass back to the wild soon, but right now, he's here. Make him your bitch while you can, get some sort of gratification out of it."

Kevin gave another stern nod. He tried so hard to be tough, and it wasn't like he wasn't, but Dean wasn't about to throw him in the backseat. His skills were better put to use back where he was safe. "Fine. Her last stop was about an hour ago near Harrisburg. She filled up before she gunned it out of the gas station. With that model Jeep, I'd say she could be on the road for at least six or seven hours. She might get down to Virginia."

"Yeah, but it's gonna take us about twelve hours to even ballpark the east coast. If she keeps her pattern?"

Kevin nodded. "If she stays course, she's headed down towards Florida. You'd probably be able to intercept south of Raleigh, North Carolina. She'll be taking back roads, though, now that she's had her vehicle flagged, or she'll dump it all together. It's all a wild guess, but it feels like a pretty good one. Sam did some research on the Knights of Hell and there's an old legend that a black mass was held to raise one in Charleston just before the civil war, that it scorched a mark into the stone basement of the plantation house."

"South Carolina?"

"Yeah. It's our one lead that made any sense. If things change between now and then, I'll call you, but for now, head for Fayetville and cross your fingers."

"Yeah, wish us luck, Kev. Thanks, buddy." Dean clapped Kevin hard on the shoulder before heading out, an hour out from full dark. Sam followed with his bag, tossing it in the back seat.

"Cas, you can take shotgun. I've got a ton of books to tear through on the drive." Cas didn't question it, taking the front seat as Dean turned the engine over.

"We've got one more stop before we can head out, shouldn't take long."

Sam glared from the back seat, leaning forward. "We can't waste anymore time, Dean. I swear if you stop for pie..."

Dean tried not to laugh, shaking his head. He looked over at Cas as he rolled the Impala around the dirt road from the bunker, pulling aside his t-shirt, revealing the tattoo there. "You're gettin' inked up, babe."

Cas' eyes went wide, but he didn't protest, nodding and turning eyes-front back to the road. Sam started to argue again. "Sammy, I've driven this whole freakin' country a dozen times or more. I'll beat that bitch to Charleston, OK? I told you, we're not walking in blind to this. If we face her, we do it prepared, with the upper hand. You want me to drag Cas in front of a demon that could possess him? Yeah, that would make an awesome new twist in our saga of crap."

Sam collapsed back in his seat with a dramatic sigh and Dean noticed him shift awkwardly, like he'd sat back on something. His heart clenched and he wondered if Sam could feel his wings, how that even worked. He'd never thought to ask. There wasn't time to have some heart to heart about it, not now. He wasn't exactly ready to, either. "You're right, sorry... this is just a fucked up situation."

"I know it is, Sammy. I'm just trying to keep it from getting anymore FUBAR."

Sam opted to stay in the car when Dean pulled up to the tatoo parlor. He laid three hundred dollars cash on the counter and showed one of the aritists his own tattoo and told them Cas wanted the same. When asked where he wanted it, Cas went blank, taking the suggestion of between his shoulderblades off the cuff from the artist. Dean almost spoke up, but Cas was already being led back to a chair, taking off his shirt. When he laid face down, the artist gave a low whistle, asking where he'd gotten scars like that. Dean grimaced, letting out a sigh when Castiel was quick on his feet and said it was from a motorcycle accident. He'd wondered if Cas even knew about the scars, shiny pink streaks that fanned out on either shoulder. He hadn't brought it up yet, he didn't want to be the one to tell his lover there was evidence on him of where his wings had once been.

The cash on the counter made the ordeal quick and questionless. In less than an hour, Cas had shiny black ink in the center of the two scars and Dean could stop worrying Abaddon might smoke out into him. He checked off a box on his mental list and gave the guy another twenty while Cas put his shirt back on. Dean squeezed the back of Cas' neck as they left the shop, heading back to the car. "You did good in there, bud."

Cas shrugged, walking around to the passenger door. "I've learned to just keep quiet if I don't want to seem out of place. Like you said, head down, eyes up, ass tucked in, right?"

Dean grinned at him over the hood of the car before he pulled the door open and they both got in. Sam looked up from the ancient book spread across his knees. "We good?"

Dean nodded, backing out of the space and navigating back towards the main highway. "We're good."

\---

Sailing across the Mississippi into Tennessee lulled Castiel to sleep. His mind put up blackout curtains to the world as the sun prepared to edge up on the horizon, tugging him down into a deep rest. His consciousness sank down, swallowed with gobs of sleep spit towards the shining eye in his heart, and there it dreamed.

Gravestones of granite and concrete. Fake flowers sun faded, left to sit vigil in absence of the loved ones left in the absence of their loved ones lost. Grass that lived on and was cut down, a tended place left to mark the lives lived out in flesh bodies. A cabin on the far end of the grounds. An old man that made his coffee with chicory every morning and did good work, kept a close eye on the magnolia trees and the rose bushes. A gardener. /The/ gardener.

He wasn't aware of a voice calling his name outside the shining eye until he felt a strong hand on his shoulder, shaking him awake. He took in a sharp breath and his eyes snapped open. Morning sunlight burned them and he closed them again, groaning. Sam still held his shoulder, leaning up between the seats. "Cas, are you OK? Talk to me!"

Castiel tried to find his voice on a dry tongue, panting. "Riverview Gardens... Loudon, Tennessee."

"What?" Dean turned in his seat. He'd stomped on the brakes and pulled them off on the shoulder of the highway. "Baby, what are you talking about? You were shouting, you kept saying a name. /Joshua./ What's wrong, what did you see?"

Cas looked up again, staring at Dean and the urgency in his face broke Dean's heart a little more. "Yes. Yes! Joshua. He... he called to me, he's here. We have to see him, he'll know what we need to do."

"Cas, we talked about this, it's just a nightmare--"

"It wasn't, Dean! This is real, I can't explain it right now, but he's on earth and he came to me."

"Loudon?" Sam asked, breaking in before Dean could be the blunt hammer of reason. Castiel nodded, wetting his dry lips. Sam sighed through his nose, leaning back, opening a map. "We're an hour away, maybe. It's not far off the path."

"It was just a dream, though! Abaddon's /real/!"

"Just drive, Dean."

He caught Sam's eyes in the rearview and something there was more like the bottled tornado that had once been Cas than the solid sternness of his brother. Dean pressed a hand to his brow and looked around at the quiet road, golden with morning light, empty. He put the car in drive and carried on towards Loudon.

The road snaked back and forth over the river. By the third bridge, Castiel had gathered his wits about him again, beginning to speak. "Jimmy always had a gift."

"Yeah, you said, latant psychic ability or something."

"Yes. My Grace, it... enhanced the gift. That's what Joshua used. He must be like me, he must remember who he is. He came to me and he told me he knows, I don't know what, he just said he knows and he told me where he is."

No one had to say they remembered Joshua, or that it had even been on Castiel's prompting the first time they were sent to find him. Dean recalled that Joshua was the only one in Heaven who had kept tabs on God. Maybe the Big Guy had called him up to pass on a little help. Maybe... Dean's faith hadn't quite made it all the way up the ladder, and why should it? God had fucked them over and turned his back more times than Dean could count. Joshua, though, he'd trust. Mostly because he didn't have the option not to. He got the impression that if he refused to stop in Loudon, Sam or Cas or both would mutiny and drive there themselves. He could only hope the lost time would be worth it. He wasn't in the mood for tea and philosophy with a former angel when a current demon was still on the loose.

The town wasn't far from the highway. Dean followed the river around to the cemetery, hard to miss. It was the punctuation mark of the town before it faded back into woods and river, a flat meadow dotted with old live oaks and tombstones. He crept the Impala around towards the cabin at the back and Cas was out of the car before he had put her in park.

Joshua came out of the house as Cas reached the steps up to the porch, looking just as Dean and Sam remembered him from the Garden. A bright smile split his face through his greying beard and he pulled Cas into a tight hug, squeezing him until the other's back popped. Castiel let out a strained laugh and hugged him back just as tight. Dean realized it was easy for him to forget that the other angels were Castiel's family, as big and estranged of one as they were. He saw Cas' feet leave the ground for a moment before Joshua let go of him, pulling away and looking past him to Dean, then to Sam. "Well I'll be... I didn't believe it until I've seen it."

Cas whispered loudly to him, 'you see it?' and Sam shifted uncomfortably. Joshua laughed, waving them all inside. "I guess you could say I have tenure over you," he teased Castiel lightly, making Sam squirm again under an intense, scrutinizing look as he passed into the small house. The expression lifted and Joshua smiled, patting Sam's shoulder affectionately. "I know you're in a hurry, so I'll be brief. Sit down and I'll pour coffee."

Dean looked cagey but sat down at the small breakfast table, facing out over the cemetery through a large bay window. It wasn't such a bad place. For being on a boneyard, it felt cheery. Castiel wrung his hands in his lap, his attention laser focused on Joshua as he brought them all mismatched mugs of coffee. "It was the Tablet that kept Abaddon here. The power in it is great, it protected her from the Purge. You're on the right track following her to Charleston, the old sigil is still burned there and if she reaches it, she may be able to reopen the gates of Hell, or worse, use the Tablet and enter Heaven."

Cas' face was drawn with worry. "But how could she--?"

"This has gone completely off book, Castiel. Dear little brother, you were a lucky penny on the tracks that derailed the whole thing. And despite everything, it's noble of you, in the end, it was brave. What came after, though, well... God has the capacity for forgiveness for a reason. And others slipped through the tear you put in the fabric of destiny, too. The totality of what has come to pass doesn't sit on your shoulders alone. Don't let it." He was looking at Castiel like Dean remembered his mom looking at him once. Sam had bumped his head on the coffee table, had needed a few stitches, and he had felt so terrible that it had happened because he had been watching cartoons instead of paying attention to Sammy. Joshua looked at the fallen angel with sympathy not because Castiel was guiltless, but because some of the worse mistakes one makes in their life are the ones they didn't mean to make at all. Because guilt was fatal. Because life was flawed.

"Heaven is full of Grace now, disembodied, a nuclear reactor falling out of balance. If Abaddon is allowed to access that kind of power, with only Metatron to defend it--and he cannot wield it, Castiel, he isn't made of the right stuff to carry that kind of power--the whole world, all of it, everything, is doomed to the kind of madness that seized Lucifer when he fell."

An icy tingle had clutched Sam's heart and squeezed, piano-wire thin veins of fear slicing into him. "How can we stop her?"

Joshua stirred sugar into his coffee and sat back in his chair, shaking his head. "She'll have to wait three days for the full moon. That's the only time she can open it. If you can stop her before she can use the sigil and break the Tablet, the energy released may reverse Metatron's spell."

"Oh that sounds easy," Dean gritted out sardonically.

Sam shot him a look before turning back to Joshua. "How are we supposed to destroy the Word of God?"

"Only an angel can do it. And luckily..." He raised his brows and smiled. Sam ducked his head down again, brows furrowed. "Sam, you earned this. It wasn't written this way. God set up all the pieces, some with different endings, but this one, he had to worry around. You Winchester boys, you sure know how to get his attention. The trials should have killed you, Sam. That's how it's meant, that you make the ultimate sacrifice for the sake of others, but with Metatron making Heaven so vulnerable, and the Tablet in unclean hands, he had to think on his feet. He brought you back with Grace to /save/ us, Sam, to give the world another chance. Seems you boys are the best ones to be handing those out to, anyhow. This is a gift, Sam. You've proven yourself to be deserving of this state of being."

Castiel had begun to cry silent tears, his hands balled into white knuckled fists around each other. His Father had not abandoned them, not truly. Always at the brink, His Love opened another hopeful window. Joshua pointedly ignored Castiel's weeping, keeping fixed on Sam. Dean slid a hand under the table to rest on Cas' knee. 

"Have you used it yet?"

Sam bit his lip, shaking his head. "Not really. I healed Cas a little, and I... feel like I just know things. Hear thoughts sometimes."

"Do you /feel/ it?" Dean's attention snapped to Sam. He didn't want to know just as burning bad as he did. Sam hesitated before nodding again. Joshua smiled wide. "You've got a handsome pair of wings, boy." Sam actually blushed at that, letting out a weak laugh. "Cas will have to try and teach you, he'll be a good person to learn from. In the end, though, just trust it. That Grace in you is part of God, part of his intent. Trust it and it wont lead you astray."

The room went quiet for a moment in tense silence before Joshua stood, giving them all a look. "Well what are you waiting for? That's all you need to know from me, that's all God told me. Go!" The three of them rose quickly, Dean chugging down coffee, heading towards the door. "You take care!" Joshua urged, squeezing Dean's shoulder and leaning in. "You watch after both of them, and if you can, every once in a while, let 'em watch out for you, too. You hear me?" Dean sputtered at him, halfway out the door, hand in his pocket clutched around his keys, but managed to nod, following Sam to the car. Joshua walked behind them beside Cas, who had managed to compose himself somewhat.

"Castiel, you know that God took your Grace out of mercy. Don't you?" The other said nothing, standing a few yards away from the car, turning towards Joshua with a look of confusion in his eyes. Yes, he understood that, but he didn't understand /why/. "Brother, he gave you this life. You may not have been able to choose it, but you would have in the end. He knew you would not have made it if you'd fallen with the rest of them."

"But it was my blood, my being fallen that was the last of the spell! He made it--"

"Uh uh! Mysterious ways... but know that. Know that God took your Grace cleanly, with mercy, and left the rest of your heart intact. He thought that was important. Do not be ungrateful of a miracle like that. God thought your heart, broken as it was, was important."

Dean shouted for Cas to get a move on and he took a step towards the car, giving Joshua a sad smile. "Thank you," he offered, his voice soft.

Joshua raised his hand in a wave, smiling back. "You watch out for yourself."

Cas pulled open the passenger door, his smile lifting into something more genuine for a brief moment. "I've got some help."

\---

Coming through the mountains into North Carolina, Kevin called them with updates. As far as he could tell and had been able to hunt down, Abaddon had holed herself away in southern Maryland for the night. Dean asked him how he could be so sure and just trusted the kid when he started talking technobabble about triangulating hacked low-jack systems of stolen cars reported over police scanners in her hypothesized path. They decided it would be safe to stop for the night, let things settle, keep themselves rested and alert. They still had three days and Charleston was only six hours away, at most, now.

They had found a motel, the usual seedy joint, but Sam kept insisting he would be of more use back at the bunker, that he could research there while Dean and Cas got some rest. Dean wasn't keen on the idea, but Castiel humored Sam's wanting to 'zap', sitting him down on the far bed, facing one another seated cross-legged, knees to knees. Sam looked nervous as hell and Dean went for a beer and food run, seeing his hovering wasn't helping.

Cas' voice was smooth and soothing, his hands laid over Sam's on his knees, talking him through slow breathing, working with him like he had when he had taugh Sam to heal him where to feel his Grace and to move it, to be completely aware of it. It took him some time, but Sam began to get a hang of it, sensing the thing inside him that was so much larger, so much vaster than anything he had ever imagined. He had taken an advanced astronomy class his freshmen year of Stanford, one of the required science credits he needed, and he'd come to class stoned during a lecture about other star systems. His mind had tried to fathom the hugeness, the power of giant stars, of nebulas and supernovas and other spinning galaxies, but the very real power inside him now shrank all the profundity and beauty from that one mild-altered experience, one that until now had gone down as one of his most religious. (He wasn't entirely proud of that fact, but the wonder of the world had always struck Sam in the strangest ways, at the strangest times. Falling into Lucifer's cage, he had thanked God with utter sincerity that Dean was safe, that he had been able to save the world from at least this.)

Castiel watched him, eyes closed, head tilted slightly back, and felt a petty sting of envy as the keening whine of Sam's true voice began to grow inside the room, a light emminating from under his skin, golden bright as autumn mornings. It was different, unlike Grace he had seen before. Sam's was... human. The heart of him in the grandeur intent of an angel's being. He squeezed Sam's hand before the voice got too loud. Sam's eyes snapped open and Cas saw black dots in his vision for a moment before the familiar hazel was staring back at him again. "You were singing," Castiel explained, a sadness under his voice he wished he could have masked. "That's good. That's very good. You'll have to keep that tucked away, though. At least for now."

"Right, no blown windows..." Sam gave a sheepish smile and closed his eyes again.

"Just sink back into it again, and imagine your room at the bunker. Focus on it clearly, see a specific spot, your bed, a chair, anything. And then imagine that place in all of your Grace." Sam had turned his hands over and was holding onto Castiel's fingers, tightening his grip.

"I'm nervous," he admitted, his brow wrinkled, eyes squeezed shut.

"Don't be. Trust it. I believe in you. I'm going to let you go now so you don't take me with you. Text me or your brother when you're there. If you land wrong, call me and I'll do what I can to help." He dropped Sam's hands and scoot back on the bed.

Sam took a deep breath and let it back out loudly, his shoulders drawing up to his ears before relaxing again, settling quietly. The keening began again, but it leveled off at a low hum, spiking briefly in pitch before the hushed rustle of wings brushed it away and Sam was gone.

A moment later, Castiel's cell phone beeped with a text. /Made it! :D/ He smiled, at least part of him happy for Sam. A part he didn't like having was still coiled tense with jealousy, but he ignored it, let it brood all by itself in the back of his mind.

He opened a new text to Dean. /Sam made it back safely. Please do the same. I'm going to shower./ The phone beeped again just before he went to turn on the water.

/im fine, bby. just went out to grab beer & food. chinese. u want fried bananas?/

For all of the urgency of it, all the tight lines around Dean's mouth, racing towards Abaddon, at least this much felt normal, felt relaxed. Simple things through life made Cas happy, stupid human things that most people might have found tedious or boring, they were bright spots on a shifting dark canvas to him. /Yes, please./ Tomorrow would be back on the road, back on high alert. He'd enjoy this while he could.

He stood under the water, as hot as he could take it, and thought again that God had returned to save them. God had intervened, pulled from his carelessness and abandoment to save them. Again. The ache in his heart blossomed like moon lilies and he had to sit down in the shower for a while and cry himself out. It ached and he didn't understand it, but there was a release in the tears, as well, a happiness behind the anchor on his heart. His faith had been so fragile, no wonder he had fallen, but just when he was thinking the only thing left to believe in was Dean, and Sam, and the human, weak mortals he had seen with his own eyes hope beyond hope to defeat things far stronger than themselves, miracle of miracles... and God had saved them.

Mysterious ways... what an understatement. But as he collected himself enough to stand, washing himself before the hot water ran out, he was thinking perhaps it wasn't so mysterious after all. He thought, for a brief, mortal-minded dumb moment, an understanding he couldn't grasp but felt lighting around in his heart, that he was beginning to understand. At the very least, he was beginning to hope.

.


	6. Two Mississippi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brief reprise into something better lends little help to the problem at hand.

When Dean returned, Cas was clean and damp, unbashfully naked on the bed, toweling his hair. Dean thought it was one of the best sights he'd ever witnessed. Domestic, comfortable, beautiful, intimate. For at least a little while, they could pretend this was maybe only a road trip and not some death march to stop yet another end of the world, one more suicide mission for the sake of unknowing, ungrateful others.

Cas pulled on a pair of boxers and they sat together with their backs against the headboard of one of the beds, eating Chinese food straight out of the containers. The talk started light at first, testing the waters, casual while they enjoyed dinner and beer before Dean asked Cas how he was holding up, new-human-wise, if he was feeling all right physically, in good shape, if he was starting to get a hold on the whole emotions thing. Castiel took a long time to answer, pondering into the depths of his lo mein as if the explanation of what his current mental state was like would be spelled out there.

"I haven't exactly had time to cope with it. Coming back to you, that's the most I've had to think about it, to deal with it. It's been one battle after another since I came back, there isn't a lot of time to sit and think about my new purpose in life."

"I know that. I know, baby..." Dean said gently, feeling bad for having asked, like Cas was a big boy and could square up easy and they wouldn't have to talk about it or deal with it or get through it, that maybe it would just clear up. "I just mean, you said some things a while back that got me scared you might be hanging off the edge of the deep end, you know? And I really can't imagine what it's like for you, to have fallen. I just need to make sure you're not gonna crash and burn on me, OK? I have to make sure you're all right."

Castiel sighed heavily, setting down the lo mein container. "It's been very difficult for me. I feel very conflicted about it. I was numb with anguish at first, lost and hopeless and overcome with the intensity of human emotion, of feeling so raw on the inside. I still don't quite know how to deal with that. I'm conflicted between being angry and thankful, of accepting this, because I was proud of being an angel, even if I wasn't a very good one, but... I don't know, I think I'd always been jealous of human... complexity. Of emotion and love and all of it in the face of finite, inevitable mortality. I think part of me was always sort of human to begin with." He bit his lip and turned towards Dean a little more. "And I don't think that we would be together now if I was still an angel."

Dean was shocked for a moment, but hearing Cas say that, he was probably right. "Maybe, yeah. I guess you did always feel way out of my league before." Cas gave him a look and Dean shrugged apologetically. "Really, though. This has always been between us. This has been happening since you first walked into that barn, Cas."

"You stabbed me that night."

"Yeah, well, I suck at flirting." That got a smile out of Cas and Dean's heart flopped over clumsily. "I'm serious. Am I wrong? For as long as we've known each other, we... clicked. It just worked out like this. You frustrate me and you've been a dick and you've fucked up a lot, but at the heart of it, I always knew you were trying to do something good, that you were doing what you thought was right, and there was a light inside you that I loved from the beginning. We never talked about it, it was just... there. The damn looks, you telling Sam we had a freakin' profound bond, I mean come on, baby. We've been driving this road for a long damn time. And yeah, seeing you home again and knowing you were just flesh and blood like me now, it's probably what got me to finally say what I've been thinking for four fucking years."

Castiel felt a swirling warmth in his chest grow at Dean's words. He pursed his lips and shifted closer to Dean on the bed, shoulder to shoulder with him. "No, it's true. And hasn't everyone been telling you that? You were the wreck of me. My love for you, Grace isn't meant to feel that sort of thing. It wasn't some pure angelic love, the sterile compassion God tried to encourage in us, it was human love. I've been falling since I pulled you out of Hell, Dean. And it hurts, but I don't care. With my Grace, I knew how you felt for me and that was enough, just to know. I didn't have any physical desire but to protect you, I understood we shared that love, and I knew that if it ever came of anything else, you would tell me when you were ready."

"I should have told you ages ago."

Cas shrugged. "Things happen the way they happen. At least they happen." He leaned his cheek on Dean's shoulder, picking up a fried banana and nibbling around the edge of it. "My point is that yes, we've been falling in love with one another for a long time, and yes, I'm still shaken up and upset that I fell, but it's worth it. You are worth it. If I was given a choice now between having my Grace again or staying with you, the choice would be easy."

Dean was quiet for a long moment before he leaned down and kissed Cas' hair. "Hang on, I wanna show you something." He scoot away from Cas and off the bed, going to his duffel, digging under his spare clothes. Finding what he was looking for, he brought it back to the bed, sitting back down. Cas straightened up, looking at Dean's closed fist, curious. Dean took in a steadying breath before opening his fingers and holding up a silver band between them. "This was my mom's, and it was her dad's wedding band. She used to wear it on her thumb, it was too big for her." He cracked a nostalgic smile, holding the ring a little closer to Cas, letting him see the worn white gold and the engraving along the inside, an old binding sigil for protection and harmony, worn nearly to nothing after all the years. "I used to wear it a lot, but I almost lost it once and got paranoid, so now I usually just keep it in my bag. When I turned sixteen, dad passed it down to me and he told me to give it to the person I trusted to keep my heart." He took another deep breath to calm himself down, he was starting to shake. His eyes lifted to meet Cas' and he almost chickened out. "Will you hold onto it for me?"

Castiel as an angel had been able to read each emotion from Dean as if it were prose. Sometimes the lack of such perception was infuriating, but in moments like these, it was endearing, and beautiful. He stared back into Dean's eyes and felt his heart twitch at how scared he looked. Dean Winchester did not get sappy. Dean Winchester did not give himself away that easily. He wasn't used to this, he was afraid of this, but he was doing it anyway. Reaching out, Cas took the ring, smiling at Dean. "Absolutely." He slid it onto the middle finger of his right hand--his fingers were slimmer than Dean's--and held it up, still grinning softly. "See? All safe."

His mind flickered for a moment to all the years he hadn't been able to keep Dean safe, even though it had been his job, all the hurt he had directly caused in Dean's life, but the look that blossomed across Dean's face now made a weight shift somewhere inside him, and it fell away. "Dude, I'm so bad at this," Dean laughed, leaning in to press his brow to Castiel's. "But you're the best goddamn thing that's ever happened to me. I mean that. If anyone has ever even come close to being in competition with Sam for the most important person in my life, it's you."

Cas felt a blush tinge his cheeks and he reached out and laid a hand on Dean's knee. "There's never been any competition with you."

Dean laughed again, leaning back, smiling. "Aw, horseshit. How long have you been around? Eons? And there's been nobody? Pfft..."

Cas shook his head, grinning. "Never."

Dean's smile dropped, his expression morphing into one of intensity, his eyes delving into Cas the way they had been looking at each since Castiel first revealed himself to Dean in a vessel. Castiel thought he could live forever in those shared glances, gladly spend an eternity in the greenery of Dean's gaze. The kiss happened like a song, pulling Cas in and capturing him. They fumbled around each other to clear the bed of the food and napkins and Castiel was in Dean's lap before Dean realized he was being pushed back against the headboard. He didn't fight it, letting Cas hold his wrists against the wall, relenting into his kiss, opening his mouth and letting Cas' tongue explore, moaning softly when he started to bite at his lips, gasping when he edged on the side of rough with it. He let Castiel undress him, leaning forward to allow him to take his shirt off, purring under his hands as they slid across his chest.

He loved the look in Castiel's eyes, amazed and intense, so engaged in what he was doing every time he touched Dean. His mouth found the edge of the hunter's jaw and Dean was melting butter under him, beginning to squirm. Cas' lips ventured down his throat and then back, finding a place behind his ear and working at it with tongue and teeth and Dean let out a strangled cry, his fingers digging into Castiel's back. Cas bit down hard and Dean whimpered his name, bucking his hips upward. Nobody ever found that spot so easy. Leave it to Cas to know exactly what to do with it. He was panting in under a minute, having to push Castiel away before he completely lost his sanity. Cas' eyes were huge and dark, his lips swollen and wet. Dean took a good long moment to just look at him, to /bask/ in him, reaching up and running one hand down his chest, the other squeezing his hip.

Castiel didn't fight him when Dean rolled them over, laying Cas out under him, smearing his lips across his collarbones and spreading his fingers on every inch of skin he could reach. Cas arched and sighed, responding to every touch with undampered abandon. Aside from the bare fact that he was /Cas/ and Dean had never wanted to be a part of another person so badly in his life, he was also already the best lover Dean had ever had. Nobody moaned his name like Cas did.

He worked his way down, gnawing at a hip bone, nuzzling his nose into Cas' navel, swiping the flat of his tongue across the trail of dark hair to the edge of his boxers. Grabbing the waist band of them, Dean pulled them down Cas' legs and threw them across the room, crawling backwards off the bed to his duffel again, returning with lube, tossing it on the bed, making sure Cas was watching him while he popped the button of his fly, opening his jeans, reaching inside and grabbing himself, stroking slowly, letting out a little moan before he shucked off his jeans and returned to Cas naked, settling himself between Castiel's legs.

His traveling show of kiss-and-touch continued, scratching stubble across Cas' ribs, kissing the side of his knee, nipping at the inside of his thigh, teasing blunt nails across his stomach. He watched his dick twitch as he kissed his hip as passionately as he kissed his mouth and a red hot iron fist gripped his insides when Cas sobbed out "please".

There was no hesitation this time. He wet his lips and got comfortable with one of Cas' legs hooked around his back and gently kissed the dewy crown. A shudder wrecked through Cas' body and Dean savored being able to do that to him. He did it again, opening his lips around the head and sucking gently, teasing the slit with his tongue. His attention stayed focused at the tip for a while, careful not to work Cas up too much, letting spit roll down the shaft until it was slick before he began to take more of Cas into his mouth. His eyes flicked up to watch Cas fisting the sheets, his head thrown back, a long groan rolling off his tongue. Screw the Grand Canyon or the Redwood forests or the high desert, all of it. /This/ was a beautiful sight. He began to bob his head, sucking and swirling the point of his tongue, slow and precise. When Cas looked down at him, he met his eyes and slid as far down as he could, nearly taking all of him into his mouth, giving a good hard suck before sliding back to the tip and circling his tongue around it.

Castiel's resolve faltered and he bucked up into Dean's mouth, whimpering. Dean let him a few times, sinking back down and flinching against the gag reflex when the head hit the back of his throat, but after a few thrusts, he pushed Cas' hips down, going back to work at his own pace, slower this time. When he didn't think he could stay patient much longer listening to Cas moaning his name, he grabbed blindly for the lube, slicking his fingers. Kissing along the side of his shaft, he rubbed a slow circle around Cas' hole, prodding a singer finger inside.

Cas let out a wail, spreading his legs and tilting his hips up. Who knew Castiel would be such a receptive partner? Dean had grown up around the kind of machismo that said if you liked something in your ass, you were a pansy. That if you were into dudes, you probably weren't going to last long as a hunter, as if it were a sure sign of weakness. Dean had always taken that so much to heart, fighting it off like every other weakness, most especially any involved emotions that weren't blind rage. Cas responded to him like he had never experienced that kind of engraining. And Dean realized, he hadn't. No bizarre mixed messages about how sex was both special and dirty. No painting up the idea of being fucked by another man as a testament to weakness or a source of shame. Just pleasure, just his lover under him enjoying himself, unbridled. Part of Dean was actually fucking jealous.

He kissed at Cas' dick more than he sucked as he stretched him, crawling upwards and nibbling a dark bruise at the hollow of Cas' throat, scissoring two fingers inside him and getting the best sounds pouring from his lips. "Dean..." He would never get tired of hearing his name if Cas kept saying it like that. "Dean, are you going to make love to me?"

The question spooked him. He looked up at Cas, a little rattled. "Do... do you want me to?"

Castiel's hands came up and snarled themselves in Dean's hair, yanking him into a kiss, sobbing out, "Yes!" into his mouth, as if he would stop breathing if Dean didn't take him. He couldn't deny such a reaction, such a desperate plea. Dean slipped in a third finger and proceeded to drive Cas insane with them, the other writhing under him, kissing him madly, one of his hands snaking down between them and taking hold of Dean, stroking him with shaking fingers. He was beginning to ask "please" again, whispering it against Dean's mouth, squeezing his cock to emphasize his need.

Dean kissed at his ear, rocking his hips into Cas' hand. "Are you ready?" There were no words, only a shaking breath leaving him and a nod. Carefully, he slid his fingers out of Cas, sitting back on his heels, pulling away, wrapping his lube-slicked hand around his cock and stroking, making sure he was well covered. He stopped then, leaning in a little. "Do you, um... do you want me to use a condom?"

Cas choked on a laugh, grinning at Dean, a wide smile Dean didn't think he'd ever seen him wear. "I healed you hardly a month ago, I know it's safe."

Dean thought 'fair enough', crawling forward on the bed and spreading Cas' legs, kissing his knee again, positioning himself. He leaned forward, holding himself up on one hand over Cas, the other steadying his cock at Cas' entrance. Castiel wrapped his arms around Dean's neck, looking anxious. A silent question passed between them and Cas wet his lips before giving a tiny nod.

Careful and steady, Dean pushed inside. He had to fight to keep from being overwhelmed, the tight heat, the passionate sigh from Cas, the fingers gripping at his shoulders and the legs wrapping around his waist, it was too much, but he kept himself in control. As he pushed in all the way, he brought his hand back up to support himself, pressing down over Cas, finding his mouth and kissing him to replace all the words he didn't know how to say, all the things there weren't any words for. Cas clung to him, kissing him back with every ounce of want and passion matched. Dean rocked his hips until Cas was bucking against him, finally drawing back a bit and beginning to thrust. He was slow and precise, gentle, feeling Cas hug around him, tight and perfect. He knew it had to hurt at least a little, but if it did, Castiel didn't seem to mind. He clutched at Dean and gasped and purred just like before, nibbling at his earlobe and growling softly, "You feel incredible inside me." Dean gave one hard, deep thrust and the moan Castiel let out rippled through him.

All of it felt as natural as breathing. They moved together without having to think about it, Castiel's hips rising up to meet each of Dean's thrusts, their rhythm like waves, rolling and intense, then slow and soft, crashing into one another fluidly. Dean slid his arms under Cas, feeling at his shoulderblades, at the smoothness of the scars across his back, staring down at his face, a mask of pleasure. "You are so beautiul, baby..." He didn't usually say crap like that, it usually sounded stupid, but it was true and it felt right. Cas let out a breathless laugh, opening his eyes again and staring up at Dean before tugging him down into another kiss. Dean's pace quickened and Cas grew louder, stroking his hands down Dean's ribs and sucking at his tongue. Dean's control waned for a moment, his hips hammering into Cas for a dozen thrusts or so, pulling an exquisite shout out of Cas that had Dean moaning like a whore, too, but he had to catch himself, ebbing his eagerness, circling his hips again, peppering Castiel's throat in kisses and gentle bites. In the back of his mind, he was thinking that he wanted this to be special, reminding himself that this was Cas' first time, that he was taking his virginity right now, but all that sappy, confused thinking was shot to shit when Cas pushed up against him and rolled, pinning him down on his back, Cas sitting his full weight over Dean with a loud noise of pleasure.

Dean gaped at him, stunned stupid as he watched Cas roll his hips and start to ride him, slow at first, then up and down, his fingernails sliding down Dean's chest and his eyes closing tight, a look of blissed-out concentration. From this position, Dean could watch his cock slipping in and out of Cas as he fucked himself down on it. How did he get so lucky? A man he loved more than life, trusted despite being betrayed, and desired beyond comprehension, and instead of pining for him silently anymore, he was his. /His/, dammit, and gladly so if the way he was mewling as he rode Dean's cock was any indication. Leaning forward, Cas went back to kissing Dean, thrusting his hips to slide Dean in and out of him. Dean kissed him almost roughly, reaching down and grabbing his ass, spreading him open, thrusting up into him. When Castiel pulled away to sit up again, leaning back and grinding himself down against him, Dean had to bite the tip of his tongue to keep from screaming out a moan, to distract himself from cumming. Trying to be inconspicuous about it, he reached down from his hands on Castiel's ass to his own sac and tugged, relaxing a bit when the tension coiled in his gut let up ever so slightly. He laid back and watched Cas entertain himself, watched him discover what he liked and find pleasure as he rode Dean, attempting every angle he could, rising up off him almost completely and then sinking back down, lost in sensation. He found what he liked the best -- hard and deep, apparently -- and got into a quick rhythm that had them both gripping onto each other, harmonizing their groans and whispers of each other's names.

Dean was on the edge, ready to accept that he couldn't last any longer, when Cas suddenly slipped off him and moved away. The sudden lack of warmth made him gasp and he watched with a dumb-founded expression as Castiel moved up beside him, leaning back against the headboard. He shook himself of his stupor and was quick to get between Cas' legs again, hooking an elbow under one knee and pressing back into him with one fluid motion. The expression across Castiel's face as he entered him was glorious. Dean thought that when he died, he hoped that would be the last thing he saw. Castiel's fingers sought out his and laced between them, clutching at his hand, the other grabbing the back of his neck for leverage as Dean began to thrust into him, a steady, deep pace. A recommenced kiss drew their attention elsewhere briefly, but he knew this was the home stretch. He wished it could last forever, he wished he could spend days in bed with Cas. A little shyly, he broke away from Cas' lips and whispered in his ear, "Can I cum inside you?"

He felt Castiel nod and then lips were dancing across his throat. Before he could brace himself, Cas was working at /that/ spot again. He slammed into Cas, his hand shoving in between them to wrap around his lover's cock, squeezing. Cas bit at the spot and Dean slammed into him again. A ragged, loud moan of "Castiel" left him and Cas moaned back, hissing in his ear "Say my name like that again." His lips wrapped back around the bruise he'd marked over that magic call button to Dean's dick and he was rewarded with a steady pounding of hard thrusts and Dean crying out in his ear again, his voice sounding wrecked, "Castiel!" and that was all it took.

Cas tensed up like he'd stepped on a live wire and Dean slammed in all the way, their fingers trying to break one another they were squeezing together so hard. Dean let out a sob of relief against Cas' throat as he felt hot cum pulse over his hand as he was pumping Cas full of his own release. The world went hazy for a moment, a shifting blur of Cas' heat and the smell of him and his breath against his skin and when he was coming out of it and the golden moment was fading, the ringing in his ears subsided to the sound of Cas speaking like hushed prayer in his ear, over and over, "I love you I love you I love you," rushed and fluttering. Dean wrapped his arms around him and held him tight, thinking it sounded like Cas had started crying and realizing it was himself. He slipped out of Cas but held onto him until they had both come down, breathing normally, their heartbeats settling into the same relaxed rhythm.

Dean pulled away and kissed Cas' brow before he slipped into the bathroom, cleaning himself up, returning with a damp cloth and washing Cas, his hands gentle. Cas was a limp doll on the bed, purring. Dean went back to piss and toss the washcloth in the tub and when he returned, Castiel was already under the covers, waiting for him. Dean turned off the lights and crawled into bed with him, Cas scooting close and then rolling over, pressing his back against Dean's chest, Dean instinctively spooning against him, fitting perfectly. The hunter ran his hands through Castiel's hair, pressing his nose to the nape of his neck and breathing him in. "Now I lay me down to sleep," he started and Cas went a little stiff. "I pray to Castiel to always be this fuckin' sexy." The stiffness broke and Castiel let out a bark of a laugh. "Watch over me, and always love me," he squeezed Cas around the waist and the other hummed softly. "And always always grant me the gift of loving him in return. I don't know what I would ever do without him, and I don't really wanna find out." Cas had gone quiet and stiff again, but he was squeezing Dean's hand laid over his waist, his thumb trailing across Dean's knuckles. Dean kissed his shoulder, sighing against his skin. "You are probably the greatest gift this life has ever given me, and I still don't really think I deserve you, but fucking thank you for it. Because I love you, Cas, and I ain't ever stoppin'." He heard Cas sniffle a little and he kissed his shoulder again. "Amen."

\---

There were small miracles Dean held onto hope for. Waking up with Castiel had quickly become one of them. His warmth, the smell of him, the way they fit together like they'd been made to, had had their edges worn out over time, but they still made it work. He laid with his nose tucked behind Cas' ear and listened to him breathing, awake but not yet ready to move. It was only when he saw the bright square or sunshine around the blackout curtains that he pulled himself carefully away from Castiel's back and slipped out of bed.

He took a quick shower and brushed his teeth in it before stepping out and catching himself in the mirror. A grin tugged at the corner of his mouth. "Damn, baby..." he muttered quietly, gently sliding a hand over the bruises and scratches down his chest, admiring the violet bite mark at his shoulder. Cas padded in, slumped and half-asleep, squinting through his grogginess.

"What?"

Dean's grin widened. "You really tore me up." Cas didn't look so much better, blue and black the shape of Dean's lush mouth spotting his skin.

Castiel frowned, waking up a little more. "I'm sorry."

Dean clicked his tongue and told him not to worry about it, drawing Cas into his chest, pressing his face to his hair. He felt a ripple pull through him as Castiel's hands slid across his back, linking around his waist. Cas dipped his head back and Dean leaned down to kiss him, gentle and slow. When they pulled away, he rubbed fondly at the top of Cas' ass. "You feeling all right?" Part of him was snagged on the imminent fear of failure, that maybe somehow last night had been wrong, that Cas hadn't been ready, that maybe what he'd thought was the final seal on what they had been building into being hadn't gone on straight and they'd have to start all over again, refile, a bunch of emotional red tape.

Castiel must have seen it in his face. He reached up and smoothed a thumb over Dean's eyebrow, nodding. "Very all right." He kissed Dean again, trying to wriggle his tongue past Dean's teeth clumsily.

Dean laughed and pulled away, patting Cas' hip. "Brush your teeth, sleepy head." He left the bathroom and got dressed, running through his usual routine of suiting up; a knife in each boot, extra clip tucked just inside the waistband of his jeans, pistol on the other hip. The demon knife stayed in his duffel, but right on top. He went back into the bathroom as Cas was drying his face, gesturing for him to turn around. He was perfectly still and patient as Dean carefully washed the tattoo for him, gentle with it and patting it dry. "I'm sorry I didn't tell you about the scars," he offered softly as he rubbed some lotion over Cas' back.

The slumped shoulders drew up tight for half a second before they gave up halfway through a fighting stance, relaxing again. "It's all right. I saw them before I found you again." Dean nodded and continued covering the fresh ink before he leaned in and kissed over one scar, then the other. Cas trembled ever so slightly, drawing in a shaky breath. "I love you."

Dean wiped his hands on a towel before he put his arms around Cas, head craned down against the scar of Castiel's left wing. "Love you, too, Cas." Castiel put his hands over Dean's around his waist, lacing their fingers, and Dean felt the ring there, reminded like a board to the back that he'd given it to him. His stomach drew up in knots, but something in his chest went loose and watery. This was good. This was right.

They finished getting ready in comfortable silence, Cas loading up the car while Dean went to check out. They grabbed some breakfast and got back on the road, Cas calling Sam to see if there had been any updates. He put Sam on speaker after a moment of struggling with the device so that Dean could hear, too.

"She split from the hotel about four hours ago. Kev's been trying to track her, but I think I've got an idea."

"You comin' back anytime soon?" Dean asked with a good full scoop of big brother attitude.

"Yeah, just, hang on a second, I--" There was a long pause on the line and Dean and Cas looked at each other for a moment, Cas shrugging. Suddenly Dean was having to correct the car before she cut across the highway, startled out of his wits. One of Sam's long legs was over the back of the seat between them and the rest of the broad man was sprawled across the backseat. "Uh, hi, um, sorry," he mumbled, trying to adjust himself, his voice echoing from his phone to the one in Cas' hand. He finally got seated properly and ended the call, flush-faced and breathing a little heavy.

"Warning next time," Dean gritted out, giving Sam a hard look in the rear view mirror. Sam pursed his lips but apologized, opening the book he'd brought with him and leaning forward. "I found a spell we can use to find her once we're close enough. If we can ballpark her somewhere around Raleigh, we should be able to find her exact location."

"Good, I'm ready to gank this bitch." Dean had a line across the bridge of his nose from sneering, like he'd smelled rotten eggs. The sanctuary of last night with Cas had been closed off, his mind back in the job. His mood kept the car quiet all the way towards the capitol. When they stopped for gas, Sam and Cas stayed in the car, Castiel paging through a book Sam hadn't gotten around to reading yet for any other clues about Knights of Hell. He hated that his own knowledge of them was limited. Some things even Heaven did not know.

He went stiff when Sam leaned up and asked as neutrally as possible, "Is that Dean's ring?"

Castiel stared a hole through the page before he finally sighed and shut the book, turning towards Sam. "Yes. Does that upset you?"

Sam tilted his head, giving Cas a funny look, one that was almost sad. "No. Why would it--? No, it doesn't upset me." His brows arched up together and it reminded Castiel of a labrador's expressive, loving face. "It makes me happy."

Cas felt a smile pull his mouth and he wanted to tell Sam thank you, to ask how long he'd known about the thing winding its way between he and Dean, but Dean was returning to the car. Castiel opened the book again and Sam leaned back into his seat, and they drove on.

Kevin texted Sam just as they were passing under a sign announcing Chapel Hill in twenty six miles. "Hey, listen to this. Kev says Abaddon just stole a black Mustang outside Henderson and is heading south." He looked up, watching the trees around them pass. "Pull off somewhere, the spell should work from here."

Dean grabbed the first exit and doubled back along a broken asphalt frontage road until it curved away from the interstate. He pulled into a short drive that dead-ended to a chain across the old path through the woods. Sam got out with a map under his arm and Dean popped the trunk, getting out and taking things from Sam as he grabbed them; candles, oil, holy water, grave dust, a raven feather. They stepped over the no trespassing sign and Sam laid out the map, taking the items from Dean and setting everything up according to the book that he had laid open at his feet. Dean stayed out of the way, but Cas hovered with interest, watching Sam anoint the map and sprinted it with grave dirt, then light the corners as he muttered something that sounded like Creole. The fire raced along the edges, shrinking into a tight triangle before the flames died out. Sam picked up the piece of map left, comparing it to the map on his phone. "Got 'er."

Dean took backroads because he knew how to bare down on them on the top side of ninety without attracting any unwanted attention from North Carolina's finest. Cas had to close his eyes once in a while, his stomach climbing up into his throat and holding onto his tongue when Dean would pitch around a curve or open the engine up over a straight away. As an angel, he hadn't feared, but the human in him had toes tingling with the anticipation of whizz bang crash and rolling all broken glass and whining metal into a vine-choked ditch. Dean and the Impala had an understanding, though. She gripped the road and he gripped the steering wheel. In half an hour, he was pulling his boot off the gas and gliding down to a legal speed as they entered a small town just north of Knightdale.

The place was movie-set deserted, a few old pickups and a single sedan on the streets, parked in front of the dusty-windowed stores that weren't open, squat little houses sitting further back off the main street. They had made it two blocks into town and already Dean could see the other side of it ahead of them. "You sure this is the place?" He rolled on through, eyes alert, but nothing looked suspicious, just quiet.

They were already through the town and Dean was nearly cursing when Sam jutted a finger to the right, down a hill towards a large parking lot and a big brick warehouse. Just peeking past the back of the building was the front grill of a black Mustang. "There!"

"This bitch sucks at hide and seek," Dean grumbled, circling the abandoned lot and shutting the engine, letting her coast to a stop. Cas felt another roll in his stomach and he wanted to say maybe she wasn't playing games, but Dean was handing him his angel blade in the holster he's fashioned for it and Castiel stopped thinking and strapped it around his thigh, pulling the rifle up from the floorboard and loading a round into the chamber. Dean's eyes canted to the side as he slid a loaded clip into his pistol, noticing that the feather he had given Cas was laid under the lacing of the butt. For luck... he hoped maybe they wouldn't need too much of that.

They stepped out of the car and Dean looked up at the steps leading up to a rested emergency exit on the third floor, likely into an office or a catwalk above the place. The last flight of the steps down had rusted away from the wall and collapsed. Dean looked at Cas, shrugging. "You need a boost?" Castiel didn't ask, catching on to what Dean needed of him, nodding as he slung the rifle across his back and braced one hand against the wall, stepping into Dean's laced fingers and lunging up towards the steps, hauling himself onto them and ascending as quietly as the ancient metal would let him.

Sam was already around the corner of the building to find a door in and Dean had to jog to catch up, catching Sam's shoulder and pointing ahead at an open bay door. Sam gave a nod and let Dean take point, tailing closely behind him as Dean pressed his back to the brick, rolling around the corner, pistol gripped tight. Abaddon stood with her back to the door, leaning forward on her hands against a grime-covered table, strewn with books, books that looked familiar, books that were the same as the ones Sam had in the back seat. He took three steps inside the warehouse and WHOOM the concussion of the shot rang through the open space as loud as a cannon and Abaddon folded in over the point where Cas' round hit her, cursing in a voice drawn thin with rage.

Dean broke into a run, Sam's heavy footfalls behind him. Twenty yards. Ten. Five. He skidded to a halt in the dust when she swung around, her face a mad, blanched mask of pain shoved down under something else, under something that wanted to press Dean between her fingers until he was a bloody smear. His gun was out of his hands, too far away. "I thought you boys had stood me up," she rasped, obviously hurt, blood running down from her shoulder were Cas had caught her with the .30-30, a bone and meat mess that would have had most people going green in the face, but she was still standing, and there was that something else that had Dean's heart pumping cold sweat into his veins. Sam had his gun up, barking at her to back down. Dean didn't even realize she had an angel blade gripped in her good hand, the point an inch from his chest. "It's not nice to leave a girl waiting like that."

She reached out with her bloody hand and grabbed the front of his t-shirt, wrenched him towards her and around, clutching him against her chest. He heard the shot and then nothing.

"Dean?!" Castiel's voice shook rust out of the ceiling and he was coming down the steps two at a time, vaulting over the railing at the last flight and sprinting to the spot where Abaddon and Dean had been standing a hammering heartbeat ago. Sam spun in a circle, icy fingers of fear churning up his stomach. "Dean!" Cas screamed again. That wasn't supposed to happen. This wasn't supposed to be possible. This was all wrong in every way they could have planned. He looked to the table and hoped to see the angel tablet, but he knew he'd seen the bag on her before he'd pulled the trigger.

"DEAN!"

But he was gone.

.


	7. Last Train Home

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Abaddon uses Dean as a bargaining chip, but she likes to play with her food.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huge huge huge warning to anyone bothered by torture. I tried to keep metaphorical for the most part, but it's pretty intense. If it bugs you, I'd skip to the end and backtrack up to where it's safe again.

Pain, once endured, can effect a building of tolerance. A burn over a period of time in the same place by the same heat can feel less and less searing, can become perfectly comfortable. Dean has hurt himself many times on the job. He doesn't flinch anymore when he takes a punch. Cuts and scrapes and bruises are commonplace, just itches. Heartbreak, too, has worn down to a dull sense of melancholy on him after all the times he's felt it.

But no matter how many times in Hell the knife had parted his skin and burrowed its way between his ribs and /turned/, no matter how many times, it always hurts. More than the last, maybe. More than anything. He had been cut open, carved to the bone, violated and taken apart, bled dry, flayed, and as soon as the sweet tranquil bliss of nothingness edged towards him, when there were only bones left to break and a few teeth left to pull, each time he thought /now, yes now, I can die here, it can be over/, his flesh returned fresh and new, the nerves lacking immunity to the pain he had only just stopped enduring, and he endured it again. That was Hell. In a flaming, horrible, taste-of-his-own-blood, smell-of-his-own-flesh-burning kind of nutshell, that was Hell.

And he thought he could handle it. In the aftermath of being dragged out, whole again for more than a moment while Alastair resharpened the blade, he had let himself believe it got easier. In a sense, it was true. Pain on Earth paled to the pain of Hell. It was surface damage as opposed to the bubbling black scorching awfulness he had been subjected to. He had inflicted that on others, he would never forget that, even though he had almost found that place in himself where he could at least feel forgiven for it. If he could hand it out, he should be able to take it. Broken hand? Nothing compared to dragging a knife down someone else's face. Gunshot wound? Just a scratch when he thought of how warm and slick blood on his hands was, three knuckles deep in someone else's guts. He thought, you know, what doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right? There was that, at least, for all the bullshit and all the nightmares and the times he was racked with the shakes remembering what it felt like to be cut to ribbons and still live, to be so unimaginably bared and used and--

But it doesn't get easier. There is a worse pain. There is always a worse pain. The last thing he remembered was Castiel's voice screaming for him. That bitch had shaken him. Somehow, she'd gotten the better of him. His brain had gone foggy, transfixed, and she'd nabbed him. Now he was here, where ever here was. Charleston, probably. He smelled marsh and the old granite blocks of the cellar where she'd strung him up to the wall looked about right for the plantation cellar they had been chasing her to. When she opened the door to come downstairs again, a shaft of light gliding across the floor of the large chamber at the far side from him and he could swear there was a sigil burned into the stone.

But back to the pain. Because there was no escaping it. He could think when the knife wasn't touching him, a little bit, but the moment the pain was back it had his full attention, it held onto him tightly, it loved him with more force than anything else he'd ever known, smothering his senses... The knife drew back and he smelled his own blood, could feel it creeping up his throat when he coughed, and he thought about Castiel. He hoped that he will never love Dean as deeply as this blade. There were things at the point of this knife he hoped no one else would ever know, things in his psyche that were dredged up by the sharp affection of torture that he had never been able to scrub clean. Sometimes he wondered if the process of becoming a demon was slow, if it had started in Hell, if it had started even before that. Maybe the knife was caressing the demon in him, a fetus of evil, of reasonless wrath, nourishing it with the agony of the dregs of the human heart he had left. The knife inched down and slid in again and he stopped thinking about his demons.

He had not screamed, but now he screamed. It had been building up behind his teeth for the first hour and now the whole force of it crashed out of him. When he opened his eyes, he saw tiny blood freckles across Abaddon's face before he could taste it full-force on his tongue. "That's a good boy." Her voice poured over him with a tone that triggered a chain reaction inside him. It was honey and sex with daggers for consonants and it may as well have been Alastair's voice, calling him a good boy even as he carefully dissected an artery from his thigh. He went tense, tight, taut, trembling until his eyelids fluttered, unable to blink, hovering back against the wall as decades of old pain crashed into the new one. He felt the blood running down his stomach, down his bare legs, and when she reached out to touch his shoulder, he let out a sob, sharp and loud.

Abaddon's gore-red mouth curled up in a smile and her thumb caressed the mark that had been there since before she'd strung Dean up. "You know, you've made it too easy. That little angel-boy of yours? Fallen angel. Whatever. I'd tease, I really wanted to make fun, I even had a few good jabs planned, but... now that I see this..." She swept her eyes down over Dean's chest and he could feel her eyes on every mark Cas had left on him. "Well, it's a little too obvious. It would be tacky." She traced over the blunt lines of Castiel's fingernails with her own, drawing blood. Dean tensed so hard he gagged for a moment before going limp, having to remind himself to stay calm, to give in as much as he could, to not panic, and whatever he did, do not fucking talk. Don't say a word.

"I've been doing some research, reading the Winchester Gospels. That's what they're going to be called, right?" Dean only looked up at her through his eyelashes before closing his eyes again. "I know who got assigned to you down there, Dean. And he's a very good friend. A very close... colleauge. We learned a few things from each other." He clamped down on the sound that wanted to fly from his throat when she grabbed his flaccid cock and squeezed. He imagined eggs breaking. "I know his methods, the kinds of things he liked." Her words brushed against his ear and he wished she hadn't let go of his dick because the pain had kept the memories her words were bringing up from surfacing. The pain he could take... it was the other shit that he could never really shake.

"I hate knowing he's dead," she continued from a few feet away, finding another marvelously sharp little thing to hurt Dean with. "I think I should do a little something special in his honor." Dean did not open his eyes, did not want to know what was coming, and when he felt like he was being torn in two, he did his best not to scream for as long as he could bear it.

\---

Sam squeezed his hands around the wheel, knuckles going white. He was trying to block it out, but-- "Just calm down, all right?!" He hadn't meant to snap, but the nerves inside the car were hot and jittery. Castiel hadn't stopped shifting since Sam had hot-wired the Impala in North Carolina--the keys had been in Dean's jacket pocket--and stepped on the gas headed south. He was gritting his teeth, wringing his hands, squirming around in the seat. It was making Sam antsy, antsier than he already was, given the situation.

"I can't calm down, Sam." Cas' voice wavered around the edges and Sam glanced over to see Cas spinning Dean's ring around his finger. "What if she's already killed him? What if she's changed plans and we never find them?"

Sam felt his human heart wrench at the thought, but the new strength in him soothed it. He laid his hand on Cas' shoulder, trying to lend some of the peace. "She won't. She nabbed him on impulse, she's using him as a bargaining chip against us. It wont work if he's dead."

"But what does she need us for?"

"I dunno. The Demon Tablet, probably. If the Angel Tablet could reverse Metatron's spell, I'm sure something in the Demon Tablet could reopen Hell, maybe even free Lucifer. Either way, if she wants something from us, it means Dean is alive." The speedometer read over a hundred as they passed into Moncks Corner, then out again. He bit the tip of his tongue, watching the rear view mirror as they rushed past a state trooper, but none had even seemed to notice them on their rush down to Charleston. He figured he could only thank his new abilities, that maybe wishing they didn't pull him made it so. Cas muttered 'it's true' and Sam didn't ask how he knew what he was thinking. The both of them were raw and anxious, there were few walls for Castiel's gift to work through into Sam's brain.

"How will we even know where to go? That spell wont work twice. How are we supposed to find them?" Cas' voice was growing weaker and weaker, Sam could hear him losing hope in his tone.

"You let me worry about that. I triangulated the legends about the black mass and found a plantation home that once stood on the banks of the Ashely River. The records and the home were mostly lost when Sherman came through Charleston, but the cellar was solid stone. I think I know where the site is now." Castiel sagged back in the seat. "We'll find him."

\---

Dean tried to be quiet about it. She'd put him on a table and he was beginning to choke on his own blood. Go out easy. Just as he was starting to black out, she would grab his hair and sit him up and punch him in the back until he coughed and choked and was breathing again. Rinse, repeat. Bitch... She should have known he wasn't going to offer up even a molecule or information about their plans, what they knew, what they had, why didn't she just go ahead and kill him already? But she seemed like she was just getting started.

"Alastair must have been off his game with you. Or soft. He is such a sucker for a pretty face. Or maybe he was extra special with you? Built you up a tolerance? You're hard as nails, Winchester, or dumb as a sack of hammers. Maybe both. Build yourself a little guilt house with that hardware store of crazy you've got going on." She put another cigarette out on his collarbone and Dean only let out a tiny groan.

"Ya hyaaack--" he coughed up a glob of blood and phlem, spitting it at her and missing. "Ya gonna at least lemme smoke one? Geez, I'm dyin' down here..."

Abaddon grinned, sighing at him. "You're mouthy. All right. One little puff, but you know where it's going after..." She lit another and held it to Dean's lips, letting him take a long drag off it, her lipstick around the filter. Lips still pressed around the butt of the cigarette, Dean exhaled through his nose, watching her fixated on him, confused, letting her think he was playing around, before he stuck out his tongue to draw the cigarette into his mouth, chewing out the cherry, gritting his teeth against the burn, and forcing himself to swallow, hoping it would lodge, that he would choke, hoping he would die before she hurt him any more or hurt him enough to make him say a single syllable about Sam or Cas.

"You little fucker!" she screeched, slapping him hard across the face and lifting him up, shoving her fingers down his throat to make him vomit it up. Dean felt hot tears track down his face as he drew another breath, sobbing it back out. She slammed him back down against the table and was on top of him now, sitting her weight back against the tender places where the knife had opened up verandas into his abdomen. Dean's vision went white, but he was still tethered to the world. "All right, you sorry little shit. I was just warming up, playing around, testing out how you tick. Now? Now you're gonna fucking get it..."

In the whiteness of pain surging up through his body, he thought about Cas again, he thought in a tiny instant of peace of holding Cas and being safe and warm and hoping he could touch him again, could see him again, and then the pain spiked and the moment broke, and Dean wished he was dead.

\---

They'd found a motel in North Charleston, just off the highway. Cas was pacing while Sam scoured books and maps. "OK, here it is. Or it's supposed to be. It's a shipping yard now, but before the Civil War, it was the Yates Plantation. She should have him there."

Castiel wanted to shout at him 'should? all you've got is should?' but he nodded, instead. "You said it was in a cellar. How do we get in? Where will it even be?" Sam was in the process of trying to find blueprints of the shipyard.

"I don't know, Castiel. But it's all we've got to go on, OK?" He stood up, towering over Cas, trying to seem like a source of confidence, despite not feeling much more than anxiety and fear for his brother. Even if they found them, what were they supposed to do? The only thin piece of hope was that all the times he and Dean had saved the world before, they hadn't had much more of a plan than he did now. "We go in, and we--"

His words full-stopped, his eyes rolled back, closed. He tipped back onto his heels and Cas reached out to steady him. "Sam?"

\---

The pornographic summer heat, wet and sticky, cloaked into the air even underground. A dash of brimstone and it was Hell all over again. Cold sweat mixed with his blood and pooled under him. Pain lit his nerves up like fireworks. Yessir, bright and brilliant and agony taking over him, born on the Fourth of July. She drove the knife in deeper and asked again, in a voice achingly calm, where they had the Tablet, what they knew about the ritual. He opened his mouth to speak and she leaned in to catch his words.

"Fff.... ffffffffff...gggggrlllhhhhhh..."

"Yesssssss?"

"Fuck you."

She slammed the blade in anew, the chain around her knuckles crashing into his jaw. He had caught himself praying to Castiel for help, and in between the pain blanks of his mind, he remembered that Cas couldn't hear him anymore. The ache of knowing it kept him limp for a while. Now, the urge to pray seized him again, but he didn't know who to. All the angels were on earth and as weak as him, as useless as tits on a bull. He'd rather let Abaddon cut him to ribbons before he tried calling out to Metatron.

The fishing line around his dick pulled tight again, cutting into flesh. The knife sliced off a tiny piece of Winchester real estate somewhere under his right collarbone. His heart swelled, aching and as deep and crashing as an ocean in a storm. /Sam.../ His heart reached out, desperate, hurting. /Sammy... please, Sam, can you hear me?/

"Loud and clear, Dean."

The pain stopped and the world swam around clumsily, Dean unsure if he had heard Sam's voice or only desperately wanted to.

Abaddon reacted in an instant, swinging out her arm, sending Cas sprawling back against the far wall, his angel blade clattering to the stone floor. Sam stayed planted firmly where he stood. The demon's eyes flashed and a razor smile pulled at her lips. "New digs. Impressive... but not a problem."

"Yeah, we'll see about--" Sam's cockiness stuck in his throat as Abaddon began to chant in Latin. Exalted. Return. Light and breath of God replaced to its origins. Something like that. Why in the fuck was he translating when the words were gripping him inside and twisting him around like failed rigging? Fly wires cutting into his ribs, tragedy at the theater... He remembered in a split moment of panic of Alastair trying to push Castiel from his vessel just before Sam had killed him. Was this what she was doing now? His knees buckled and he fell to the floor, feeling his Grace swell and begin to push to the surface, to leave him. The room filled with light and the high buzzing noise of his true voice.

Sam felt for certain she had bested him, was preparing himself to awaken in Heaven, out of his body, at the mercy of Metatron, when suddenly he was fine. Weak, shaken, but fine. He looked up to see Castiel still gripping the hilt of the demon knife in Abaddon's back. She screamed, a roar of anger that made Sam shudder, but he was on his feet and moving across the room as Abaddon turned on Cas and threw him again.

When she spun back, Sam's hand was in her face, pressing against in, and he knew what to do.

Light took her over. It filled her inside and then burned its way out. Her joints went to water. Her eyes liquified, vaporized. He felt his Grace pouring from his hand into her and destroying her, watched her become a hollow doll. She fell to the floor and Sam felt overwhelmed by the power inside him, taking a moment to draw it back inside his human body. His heart was pounding, loud in his ears. "Sam," Castiel groaned from the corner as he pulled himself back to his feet. "Sam, heal Dean. Sam, he wont make it much longer. SAM!"

Jerking back to himself, Sam spun around to the ragged sounds of Dean's breathing. He rushed to the table and put his shaking hands on Dean's arm. In the dimness, all he could see and smell was blood. Blood and flesh and he could feel the pain rolling off Dean in waves, could hear how shallow his breaths were, the blood in his throat. "Sammy?" He heard it more in his mind that from Dean's swollen, split lips.

"I'm here, Dean. It's gonna be all right." Closing his eyes, he focused himself, extending him Grace out into Dean as he'd done to Abaddon, but letting it stitch his brother back together. The process was slow, he was careful, afraid of hurting him further or missing any injuries. When he was done, he withdrew his Grace and stepped back, Cas draping his jacket over Dean, helping him sit up.

Sam turned away and scoured the room, his adrenaline spiking when he remembered their true intention. The Tablet. "It's not here..."

Cas had carefully gathered Dean into his arms, putting his chin in Dean's bloody hair. "She'll have hidden it. We still have two days, we'll backtrack her movements, we'll find it. We need to get him somewhere safe, first. Let him rest."

"Right..." Sam picked up Castiel's angel blade and laid a hand on his shoulder, taking them back to the motel. Cas laid Dean down on the bed, collapsing onto his knees next to him, beat up and sore. Sam's heart rolled over to see Dean in the light, caked in blood. He had healed him, but he'd done little help to clean him up. There were still some bruises, but he wasn't cut to pieces and bleeding out. Cas moved to the bathroom to get something to wash Dean but Sam waved him off, doing it for him. Bringing back a damp rag and a dry towel, he crouched next to Cas, frowning at his brother, blissfully unconscious. "Cas, you're hurt, let me heal you."

Castiel glowered at him, beginning to wash the blood from Dean's brow. "I'm fine, Sam."

"You're not, she tossed you around pretty good and--"

"I said I'm fine. I have to do this first." The hard edge in his voice made Sam back off, going over to the table where he had set his laptop and quickly banging out an email to Kevin to update him and get him on the trail of Abaddon's last whereabouts, anywhere they might find where the Tablet had been hidden before making himself a brainstorming list of where to start in their own hunt. By the time he turned back to the bed, Dean was clean and covered in a blanket up to his chin, Castiel leaned over him, cupping the back of his head, tenderly kissing his brow. Sam's shoulders sagged down and he sighed.

"Can I heal you now?" he asked, his voice edged with exasperation. Cas finally consented, coming to sit before Sam and let him heal two broken ribs and a sprained wrist. "There. Get some rest, OK? If Dean's still woozy in the morning, you're gonna be my sole backup, got it?"

Cas nodded in understanding, too tired to argue. He went into the bathroom and took a record quick shower, coming out again in Dean's t-shirt and a pair of boxers, slipping in under the covers next to Dean, carefully scooting up next to him. Sam turned off the lights and went back to his computer, being as quiet as possible. The sound of the window A/C unit rattling was the only disturbance in the room for a long while before Castiel spoke quietly from the bed.

"How did you feel, when you smote her?"

Sam let out a sigh, not looking up from his book, still reading as much as he could about the Knights of Hell. "Dangerous," he said at last, finding it the most accurate word for the feeling words could not describe. Cas nuzzled his nose into Dean's shoulder in the dark, nodding.

"Good. That's what it's supposed to feel like. Not powerful. Dangerous. Remember that, Sam."

Sam's eyes went to Cas' angel blade sitting on the bedside table out of instinct. He swallowed thickly, looking back at the page. "Right. Got it. Good night, Cas."

.


	8. Three Mississippi

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rest stops on a long road.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, fuck me, right? My mind got pretty derailed from this story, it wanted to be something much bigger than I had either the time or patience to make it, so it's been contained into this piece of a bigger story that may or may not ever get spun into words. Either way, it's done now, at least this bit, and thank you to everyone who has read it so far, and any newbies along the way that come across and read it in its fullness. I hope you all enjoy it and look out for probably at least little short pieces of this 'verse now and again along the way.

The trail was colder than Dean, who had gone thousand-yard-stare on them, speaking only in quiet tones to Cas. Once or twice Sam had gotten a forced smile out of him and a whispered assurance that he would be all right, but Sam couldn't remember ever seeing him so shaken up. Not ever. He'd looked more lively dead. Sam and Cas took leads off Kevin and followed a few hunches of their own, but wherever Abaddon had buried the tablet, it would stay there. The thought that she had passed it on to a witch for safekeeping had crossed their minds, but they omitted it. Abaddon was from out of this time. Anyone she may have known may not have been loyal now. It was hidden, and as long as it was hidden, it was safe. Or so they hoped. Like most of their lives, it sailed on on a lick and a prayer.

On the fourth fruitless day in Charleston, having decided to head back home, Dean asked to see the ocean. They left an hour before dawn and Sam went south through the marshes, finding a public beach. He pulled the Impala into the empty parking lot and Dean started off towards the boardwalk without waiting for either of them, walking through the dunes and stopping at the top of the crest, his shoulders sagging as he drew in a deep breath and looked out across the water. White, smooth sands stretched up towards a small, posh resort, and down, the island curved out towards the water, the tidal river's delta cutting their island from the one south of them. Cas and Sam walked together to catch up, Cas pointing at a sign down the island, smirking. "Look. Captain Sam's Inlet."

Sam shook his head fondly, eyes still on Dean like a concerned parent. The grey haze of sunrise caught all the white of the sand and the sea foam and in it Sam watched Dean strip down to his underwear, leaving his clothes on the shore, walking out into the water. Cas followed suit and Sam stood dumbly on the shore for a while before taking off his jeans and jacket, then finally his shirt, jogging down to the water as he watched an early runner come closer towards them from up the island.

The water was cold and shocked his system, trudging through the waves pushing him back towards the dunes as he tried to reach where Dean had already managed to wade, up to his shoulders and bobbing with the waves. Cas was having a hard time of it, waiting to get his bearings in waist deep water. When he reached Dean, Sam stretched out a hand and laid it on his shoulder. The light was growing and the freckles across his brother's back were becoming slowly visible like stars at dusk. "Hey..." Dean didn't turn towards him, looking out across the dark water and away over the horizon.

"You know how long it's been since I was in the ocean?" Sam knew that tone, knew it was story time, chick-flick moment, the kind of shit Dean didn't say twice, so you shut up and listened. "Mom was pregnant with you and Dad took us down to Louisiana. I don't remember a lot from being a kid, but I remember that day so clear. Mom took me out in the water and I kept getting my ass kicked with waves and she lifted me up and sat me on top of her belly and held me and told me not to be mad at the ocean. The ocean was just the ocean. It tossed stuff around and it could swell up and swallow towns, but it washed away bad stuff, too. It was like a big sea of tears to heal broken hearts. She told me that if I ever felt so sad I couldn't bear it, that I should go to the sea and let it take my tears and everything would be all right again, at least for a little while." He shook his head and cut his eyes at Sam. "I haven't thought about that in a long time. But it's Mom, you know? I'll take her word for it."

Sam's eyes softened and before he could say anything, the moment was broken cleanly with a large wave smacking the both of them in the face. Sam spat out a mouthful of sea water, wretching, but Dean was laughing. Sam didn't need to ask if Dean was all right anymore. He knew he wasn't. He knew whatever all right he could be was enough. Dean splashed at him and turned to see Castiel going ass over teakettle in the surf. "Enough Dr. Phil. I'mma go save my baby."

Sam watched him swim off towards Cas, watched them press close and Dean try to teach him to float and work with the waves to stay upright. The sun edged up and runners and nature lovers, morning people young and old, dotted the beach. He hated to break the moment, a weird parallel world of normal they found themselves in now and again, but the keys were in Sam's pocket in their pile of clothes collecting sand.

They waited for a gap in the people and collected their things, slinking off to the showers at the head of the boardwalk and climbing back into the car. Dean put on a pair of headphones and dug out his Walkman, laying across the back seat with his head in Castiel's lap. Sam turned the engine over and headed for home.

\---

Business as usual, that's what Dean was calling it, even if it was anything but. When it wasn't Cas waking up Dean with a nightmare, it was the other way around. They didn't sleep much, mostly just laid together holding hands in the dark and telling one another it was all right. During the day, or at least, during the time they weren't trying or pretending to sleep, Dean was running Cas through drills, teaching him to fight and finding out there wasn't a whole lot to teach. They shared knowledge about monsters and ghosts, ran into town to learn about human things like shopping and money and provisions. Sam taught Castiel how to cook a little and Kevin tried to show him how to use a computer. Cas worked more with Sam to help him use his Grace and swearing not to tell Dean, he showed him how to manifest his wings and preened them for him. It wasn't back to the same old grind, but it quickly became a new one all its own. Crowley got a job at a supermarket a town over and kept in touch and as much as could ever been for the Winchesters, things were all right.

Well, most of the time.

"Dean, I don't know about this..." Dean was grinning at him in a way that usually proceeded getting groped and then sexed, relaxed back against the passenger door of the Impala. Castiel's knuckles were going white around the steering wheel.

"Hey, you'll do fine. I'll start you nice and slow, nothing crazy. I'd started teaching Ben to drive a little, I'll tackle it with you the same way, OK? Just trust me." Oh, those magic words. Castiel sighed heavily and pressed his foot down on the brake, gripping the gear shift and sliding it down until the "D" lit up. "Good, good. Foot off the brake, and eeeease 'er some gas." The look of terror and concentration on Castiel's face had Dean biting his tongue to keep from laughing. The car crept forward, jumped for a moment, stopped, then began to ease down the dirt road. "It's OK, you have to get a feel for it. This is good, let yourself get used to it." They were hardly going ten miles an hour but there was no rush. He sat back and shut up, watching Cas drive more than he was watching the road. The first sharp turn heading towards the paved biway got him spooked some, but Castiel managed out of it without overcorrecting, getting a bit bolder and pressing down on the gas a little more.

When they made it to the paved road, Castiel stopped a little short and looked at Dean in a panic, but he smiled back at him and the look fluttered away. "You've got this, baby, it's all right. We aren't going far. Take a left."

Cas pursed his lips and leaned forward, looking to make sure no cars or farm trucks were coming before he rolled her onto the blacktop, taking a bit to feel comfortable, but getting her up to speed, edging under forty, more sure of himself on an open, straight road. Dean dipped his head back out of the open window, sucking in a big breath of fresh air. The bunker had become a home, a place he felt like he belonged to and belonged to him, but it was cramped and grew stale after a while. He was used to the road, used to trees and grass and sky, even if it was all racing past a cranked down window.

He leaned back up and watched the road when Cas slowed, maneuvering clumsily but effectively around a pot hole, commencing his speed once he had passed it. "See? You're a natural." Castiel gave a wavering smile, chancing half a second to look at Dean before he was back on the road, having to correct. Looking over had made his hands drift, as well. Dean clamped down on another laugh, refusing to let it out.

Dean let him drive a few miles out, past a stretch of wheat fields and then north to a curve in the river, telling him to slow and pull off the road into a field, navigating him around a stretch of trees and to a clearing facing the water. Castiel put the car in park and cut the engine, looking happy to be out from behind the wheel when he stepped into the tall grass, handing Dean the keys and watching him go to the trunk, pulling out a large picnic basket.

"Is this... is this a date?" He looked just as uncertain of it as when Dean had told him he was going to teach him to drive.

Dean tried to hide a scowl or the way his ears were turning pink with a blush, shrugging it off and putting his arm around Castiel's waist, heading into the clearing. "Sam's idea. I think he just wanted us out of his hair for a while..."

He walked nearly to the river bank before setting the basket down, taking out a blanket. Castiel took two corners and helped him spread it over the grass, both of them sitting shoulder to shoulder in the middle of it. Dean pulled two beers from the basket and handed one to Cas, following it with hamburgers and steak fries, still warm -- Sam had helped him sneak around cooking and keeping Cas unaware -- with a store bought apple pie underneath. Cas titlted his head, taking plates as he was handed them, asking "How did you--?" but didn't bother finishing the question, smiling softly. "You're pretty incredible, Dean Winchester, you know that?"

Dean gave him a smarmy grin, opening his beer and putting a bottle of ketchup on the blanket between them. "Yeah, I know." He leaned over and placed a small kiss against Cas' cheek. "You're not too bad yourself."

Cas took a bite of the burger and made no further conversation save for food-muffled words of approval and little moans of delight until he'd finished the whole thing. Food had become a great pleasure, little necessary bits of human life that could be either merely functional or purely decadent. Dean watched him eating, feeling a fluttering bird of pride somewhere in his chest. He'd cooked for Lisa and Ben, sure, and he'd grown up playing chef to Sam with a microwave and maybe a hotplate for most of their life, but Cas was still discovering food, taste, and it was nearly as amazing to watch him like this as it was to watch him cumming.

When the burgers were gone, Dean poured out a small pond of ketchup on a plate and they shared a container of steak fries, Castiel telling Dean stories he remembered about the formation of the river and the unique species of trees along its banks. Dean didn't really give two shiny fucks about it, but he liked hearing Cas talk, letting him go on uninterrupted. When he finally ran out of things to say, Dean had to search for his own topic to discuss. "What do you think they're all doing? The angels, I mean. Being on earth and everything, do they remember? Do you think any of them still have any of their powers?"

Castiel shrugged. "It's hard to say. Joshua clearly retained his wisdom and connection to God, and his memories, but he may very well be an isolated case of such. I would honestly hope for their sake and everyone's that they don't remember, that they're just... people now. It would be easier that way, I think."

Dean hummed and nodded, licking ketchup off his thumb. "You know... when I was a kid, my mom used to always tell me there were angels watching over me." He huffed a short laugh, shaking his head. "I remember I used to pray to my guardian angel, especially after the fire. I didn't talk for almost a year, I didn't feel like there was anything I could really say, that would matter, but I'd pray hoping it might help. When I was about eight, I stopped believing in angels, though. Serves me right, huh? I wonder who heard those prayers, if there was even anybody watching over us?" He saw the look in Castiel's eyes and tried to smile. "What, you thought I'd always been a skeptic, cynical old bastard, huh? Bet you didn't know I used to pray, too?"

"No. I knew." Something in his voice, in the way his eyes were locked on Dean like an animal trap, Dean's blood ran cold and he understood. He dropped the fry in his hand back down onto the plate and stiffened up, then forced himself to relax again.

"Cas... are you sayin'...?" Castiel looked away and pressed his lips into a tight line. Dean tried to find his words like swimming through the bottom of the ocean. "You... you've always been with us, haven't you?" Saying the words made his chest tighten up like a string on a corset, sinching his insides and something incorporeal that hurt worse than bruised organs. Something in it comforted him, made him feel more sure that whatever love was between them was right, had always been meant for this, but the other half wasn't sure how to overlay the information onto what he'd understood as his life before Cas.

"I... I'm sorry. For everything, for not telling you, for all the times I wasn't allowed to step in. I was meant to be more a watcher than a guardian. The night you were conceived, you were placed under my care. I was captain of my garrison, it didn't make sense, and there was so much that happened to you that I wasn't allowed to intervene in. I still don't understand. But yes. Yes, Dean, I've watched over you and been there at least as a watcher, as solace, for all your life. I know every secret, every hurt, every thought, and I remember every prayer." Tentatively, still not looking up at Dean, his eyes fixed firmly on a small tear in the blanket, he reached out and laid his hand over Dean's. "And I still want to know more. Maybe now, maybe powerless, this is when I finally get to protect you the way I should have then."

Panic was stitching itself a nice hem on Dean's patience, on his better judgment, but he made it stop, shifting closer to Cas, reaching to hold his chin and force his eyes back to his face. "I don't need protecting. I don't want it. What I need is a lover. A good damn friend. A partner, somebody that doesn't have any blood ties to let me think that was the only reason they'd stick around. That's what I needed all along. Not a guardian angel." He forced another smile when he watched a tear slide down Castiel's cheek, brushing it away with his thumb. "Hell, I still don't believe in angels. Not really. What I believe in is you."

Cas' brows knit together and he tilted his head again, pressing his cheek into Dean's palm, before lunging forward and kissing him breathless, the only way he knew how to thank Dean, for what, he wasn't sure. Everything, probably. When they pulled apart, Dean was able to pretend the dampness on his cheeks was from Cas. "We suck at lovey-dovey stuff..." he laughed softly.

Castiel chuckled, shaking his head. "I'm sorry. Perhaps I should read more of Sam's thought-to-be-secret collection of romance novels."

Dean barked out a laugh, his hand sliding up and down Castiel's arm. "I wasn't complaining. Every bit of pain, every hard damn haul I've been through, it's worth it for this, you know? A place that's ours, Sam safe, me and you... it won't be easy for long, I'd be stupid to think it might, but it's worth it. I don't need a fuckin' love story."

"Too bad." Dean kissed him again and somewhere between trying to tell each other with lips and light graze of teeth the things they didn't quite even understand within themselves, the waves of faith and love and fear that boiled up for one another, the pie got opened and smeared across two more fresh plates. They were full and six beers deep when they laid down on the blanket and tangled together, kissing lazily and picking out favorite spots on each other, Castiel's fingertips tracing constellations through Dean's freckles and Dean sliding his thumb across Cas' cheekbone until he'd remembered the exact angle.

The sky had grown darker but they had not noticed. When the first fat wet drop struck Dean behind the ear, he looked up, incredulous, to find dark grey clouds replacing the blue sky he remembered sitting under. "Aw, shit." The single drop was a late warning. They shoved everything into the basket and went sprinting back to the Impala just as the bottom dropped out, Dean shoving the basket into the front seat and diving into the back, yanking Cas in with him. The sound of rain beating against the car was loud and steady and they were both dripping onto the leather. Castiel looked like a drowned cat, pulling his wet t-shirt away from his chest with a sloppy sucking sound. Dean laughed, tugging at the hem. "Screw it, just get naked."

It took Cas a moment to realize Dean wasn't joking, but once he'd caught on, he was stripping out of his wet clothes in a rush, Dean doing the same, dropping them all in a soaked pile on the floorboards. For an awkward stretch, they sat backs straight, eyes front beside one another on the seat, Dean gripping the leather, stalled out and not sure what to do. Castiel lifted a hand and hovered it over Dean's thigh and finally the tension broke, Dean taking Cas' wrist and tugging him in, turning towards him, wrapping his arms around him and sliding hands over Cas' damp back, kissing him with no rush. They shifted with loud squawks of wet skin on leather, looping around one another. Castiel's fingers speared into Dean's hair and his mouth tasted like rain water.

The storm grew, leaving the loud hum of rain on the car as they fit themselves against one another in every way they could find, Dean on his back on the seat, then Cas in his lap sitting up. Fumbling around again, Dean lunged over the back of the front seat and dug around in the basket, tossing himself back into the seat with a bottle of lube in his hand. Cas was grinning and Dean grumbled at him to shut up, shifting into his lap and handing the lube to Cas, gripping his shoulders as he leaned in to kiss him again. Cas' mouth was limp, confused. Dean sat back and Cas looked down at the bottle in his hand. "I... are you... is this OK?"

Dean decided to ignore how hot his face flushed and nodded minutely, playing Cas' confusion off as ignorance. It seemed better that way. "You gotta, um... you gotta stretch me first." He lifted up on his knees, one on either side of Castiel's thighs, arched over to keep from bumping his head on the roof of the car, kissing Cas' hair. Pressing no further, Castiel opened the bottle and poured too much into his hand, rubbing it around and grabbing Dean's hip, reaching up between his legs uncertainly, tentatively touching the tip of his forefinger against Dean's ass. The hunter went rigid and groaned, pressing his face into Cas' throat, forcing himself to relax again. He at least knew better than to tense up, it would just make it hard for both of them.

Cas was gentle, uncertain but kind, massaging gently around the puckered hole before starting to press one finger inside. Dean's sigh brushed at the hairs on the back of his neck and he slid his finger all the way in, turning it slightly before withdrawing it, circling the hole again, then entering him once more. Dean's fingers dug into Castiel's shoulders, but he didn't make any show of discomfort, pressing his hips down against Cas' hand. When Castiel's lips found his ear, he went to water, moaning softly and letting Cas open him up, gasping when another finger joined the first. He wasn't exactly new to this. Hell, he'd let women do it before, but like everything else with Castiel, experience with the mechanics didn't mean shit compared to doing it with Cas.

Castiel scissored his fingers inside Dean, not bringing up all the things he was thinking, all the things he knew about Hell and what Alastair and even Abaddon had done to Dean, all the reasons this shouldn't have been all right, that they should have talked about it more, but he knew Dean well enough to know not to question an offer. If he thought he was all right enough to bring it up, Cas wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth. Craning down, his back protesting, Cas kissed the tip of Dean's cock, wrapping his lips around it as he pulled his fingers back and carefully pressed in a third, feeling Dean's dick twitch against his tongue as he sank all three fingers in to the last knuckle. Dean reached down and grasped his wrist, keeping his fingers buried, grinding his hips down against them and forward into Cas' mouth, panting against his own forearm, pressed to the roof of the car. "I-haaa, I'm ready," he sputtered out, pressing at Castiel's shoulder to get him to sit up.

Carefully, Cas drew his fingers back, pressing up into Dean one more time just to hear him gasp before sitting back, watching Dean drizzle lube over his cock and stroke over it with a few pumps to get it slick. Without having to be asked, he shifted forward some to give Dean a little better room, watching him crawl forward and guide the tip of Cas' cock to his hole, pressing down against it. Castiel put his hands on Dean's waist lightly, watching him, his heart fluttering in his throat. When Dean began to press himself down over him, a long moan leaving him as he got the head in and kept sliding down, Castiel was sure he was going to lose it, letting Dean go at his own pace and leaning up to kiss him to keep himself distracted from the heat, from the tightness, from the very idea that he was inside Dean Winchester, knowing no one else had been allowed this. Others may have been there, but he was the first to be welcomed like this by Dean's choosing.

Dean kissed him back, continuing slowly to settle his weight over Cas, sinking into his lap. He rolled his hips experimentally and Cas gave a tiny thrust upwards, frowning when Dean pulled away, his brows stitched tight together. "Does it hurt?"

The look left Dean's face and he stared up at Cas, shrugging. "A little. I'm OK. Lemme... just lemme get used to it..." His eyes slid shut and he leaned back, holding onto Cas' shoulders, rolling and circling his hips, letting them lift and fall in a slow, slow rhythm, getting himself accustomed to the feeling of being filled. Castiel watched in awe, doing his best to keep himself at bay, despite the urge in him to throw Dean down onto his back and ravage him. After some time, Dean got into a pace in Castiel's lap, opening his eyes and smirking at the look on Cas' face. "Does that feel good, baby?"

Castiel let out an unintelligible sound of affirmation before making himself nod. "Yes. It feels wonderful."

Dean massaged his shoulders and sank his full weight over Cas, groaning. "You wanna take over?" Cas only nodded and Dean slipped off on him with a little hiss, moving Cas around until he was on his knees on the floorboards, Dean shifting with his ass to the edge of the seat and his feet up on the back of the seat in front of them. Cas smoothed his palms over Dean's thighs, unable to help himself from devouring the other with his eyes, turned on but obviously shy and unsure, spread out under Castiel nonetheless.

He leaned down and kissed Dean's chin, then his jaw, then nose, and finally his mouth. "You are incredibly beautiful." Dean's freckles almost disappeared in the dark blush that flooded his face. He pursed his lips and didn't say anything back. Castiel smiled, not needing a response, straightening and gripping his cock, looking down at it with an expression of concentration that had Dean biting back a laugh until he was moaning instead as Castiel pushed back inside him in one smooth thrust. Dean had been worried he wouldn't be able to submit, that his stubbornness and the engrained machismo bullshit wouldn't lay down and let him enjoy this, but when Castiel's eyes pinned him with a look of intense possession, every ounce of hesitance left him all at once.

He reached out and brushed his hands across Cas' chest, his breath hitching as Cas began making short, shallow thrusts into him. "Please fuck me hard, baby. Make me yours, wreck me." He couldn't believe the words coming out of his mouth, or the wavering, breathless tone they left him in, but it was exactly what he meant to say. His fingers seized one of Cas' nipples and he was rewarded with a stuttering buck of his hips, growling. "Please, baby..."

Castiel should have been intimidated by such a request, but something inside him clicked together. He knew what Dean needed, how to give it to him. Putting a hand under each knee, he pulled himself out before edging back in, then again, watching Dean squirm and cant his hips up into it. On the fifth slow slide back inside Dean, he slammed his hips forward the last few inches and began to pound him. Dean's hands slapped back against the back of the seat, gripping onto the leather for dear life. Already, sweat was beading on his scalp and Cas had to blink through a drop of it slicing across his face. Dean's pants harmonized with the sharp slap of skin on skin, the creaking of the leather, the metallic groans of the car, all under the hum of the beating rain. "Is this how you want it?" Cas asked in a voice that had Dean feeling like he was going to cum any second, ramming into him hard as hell three good times and staying buried in him for a tick, leaned over and biting at his neck.

Dean screamed out, "Yes!" before he could control himself or his volume, shouting again when Castiel continued to thrust. Without thinking it through much, his hands fumbled down to his jeans on the floor, finding his phone and flipping it open. Cas tilted his head, his pace slowing but not stopping. "Wanna see it... for posterity," Dean explained in a slurred rush, pulling up the video function. Castiel nodded and changed his angle slightly, fucking Dean fast and hard again. Dean hit record, the camera pointed at Castiel's face at first, then down, angled between them. The screen showed him a better view of Cas' cock slamming into him and he let out a loud moan, watching the screen for a while as Cas worked him over. When he shifted up and hit his prostate, Dean dropped the phone to the floor, gripping his own hair and biting back a scream.

He moved up to kiss Cas when the other leaned over him but Castiel leaned towards his ear, pulling out of him completely. "Get on your knees," he rasped, leaving Dean no room for argument. Immediately, he scrambled to sit up and rock over onto his knees, sideways along the seat with his hands braced against the door. Cas moved up behind him, one foot flat on the floor, the other knee rested on the seat. He positioned himself and pressed only the tip in, leaving it there until Dean leaned back and pressed himself over it, taking all of it, rocking forward, and then fucking himself back against it again before Cas gripped his shoulder and took over.

Dean pressed his cheek to the cool glass, huffing against it. "Maybe I let you watch too much porn," he teased, immediately regretting it when Cas pulled out again.

"It may have been an inspiration, yes. Of course, I'd be doing something more like this..." He gripped himself and shoved the head back in, then out, rubbing and rutting against the crack of Dean's ass, spearing into him, pulling out, teasing over and over. Dean gasped loudly every time Cas' cock pushed inside him and whimpered each time he was empty again. Before Dean could beg him not to tease, Castiel gave him mercy, sinking back in and finding a good rhythm, the new angle driving Dean wild. He arched his back and cocked his ass higher up towards Castiel, slowly sinking down against the seat, face pressed to the leather. Cas' hand swooped down his spine and briefly gripped the back of his neck before smoothing back up, resting on his ass. Dean had no smart-alec reply to that, couldn't get much out of his mouth but moans and dirty, slurred praises or encouragements for more. Cas did not disappoint.

Dean was feeling mesmerized into the rhythm of Cas' thrusts, his heartbeat seeming to sync to it, his steamy breath pounding out half-time to the slap of Castiel's hips, then staccato, then a long melody of moans. It startled him when Cas' voice was suddenly at his ear, whispering words too soft for the way his cock was driving into Dean, "I want to kiss you." Dean twisted around to try to meet Castiel's lips, but the other was pulling out of him, making him whine before he realized he was being turned over, laid out on his back along the seat. He let out a soft, "oh", kicking one leg up into the back dash, the other hung off the seat, reaching out and pulling Cas in close, drawing him between his legs and kissing him as he slid back inside. 

The rain had slowed and Cas' thrusts matched its relaxed pace, craned over Dean, hands sliding through his hair. Dean reached down between them and wrapped a hand around his cock, letting out a long groan. "Baby, I'm not gonna last... you, you can cum inside."

Cas' brows came down over his nose but he nodded, pressing his face back into Dean's neck, working faster with Dean's hand and pants. When he was falling apart, Dean couldn't even form words, mewling and keening in Cas' ear, a voice in the back of his mind telling him he sounded like a pansy, that he was a wimp for liking this, but Castiel moaning out his name drowned it out easily.

Cas slid out and laid carefully on top of him, both of them sticky with sweat and cum and rain water, out of breath. Dean rubbed up and down Cas' back, hugging him loosely around the waist. "I'm impressed you lasted that long," he mused quietly.

Cas leaned up a little, looking embarrassed. "I climaxed twice."

"And kept going?" Dean bit his lip, feeling shitty for the look that painted across Cas' face. "Naw, it's OK. It was good. It was fucking amazing. Who knew you could fuck like a champ..."

Cas hid his flushed face in Dean's neck, biting at his lip. "I ah, I felt inspired..." Dean laughed, squeezing him around the waist, chuckling out "goddammit I love you" around kissing Cas' hair. Cas pressed close to him, bumping his nose against Dean's jaw, feeling oddly proud at that.

Dean's fingertips made light, dancing circles across the scars of Castiel's wings, his eyes closed, contented, wondering only briefly what those wings might have felt like before, but not hinged on the idea. He liked the man in his arms just as much as he'd liked the angel. "How 'bout we get dressed, drive back, and take a nice long shower?"

Cas, liking the sound of that, pulled away and they struggled back into damp clothes, Dean climbing over the back of the seat and behind the wheel, Cas following over with him, leaving the basket in the passenger seat and crowding himself next to Dean. The rain was dying out but the clouds still shrouded low above the trees, shutting out the sky. There was so much shit so close on the road behind them, but for now, it felt like open pavement. For now it could feel like a Sunday drive, like two thighs pressed together between damp denim and no years of bullshit it took to get them there.

They both knew they would have to slam on the brakes or the gas soon enough, there was never just normal for them, there couldn't be, that's not how this story went, but for now it was enough, and they'd take it as it had come. The road so far had been just as much blood and pain as hard-won love and victories, but until the wheels fell off, they'd just keep driving.


End file.
